Mister Bato, a Cahuita Legend

From the stories I heard, Mister Bato was capable of almost supernatural powers, including the ability to hold his breath underwater for hours and lift objects weighing more than 200 pounds.  Once, he rescued some construction equipment that had spilled into the river.  The townspeople asked him if he could recover it from the river bottom so Mister Bato dove down, and resurfaced two hours later with the equipment in hand. For payment, Mister Bato did not ask for much: "Solo nececito una botella de alcohól".

Walter "Gavitt" Ferguson, a Cahuita musician and songwriter, sings about a different story here in the song "Cabin in the Wata".  In this story, Mister Bato again employs some crafty tricks to try to escape his outcome when the Costa Rica National Park Service insists that he may no longer keep his cabin on the land that will be turned into the Cahuita National Park.

Mister Bato thought, 'If I can't have my cabin on the land, then I guess I'll build my cabin in de wata'!


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Cabin in the Wata
by Walter "Gavitt" Ferguson


This modern generation,
Every day the people getting smarter:
Now they made me to understand
Bato build a cabin in the wata.

   Oh, the cabin in the wata
   Mister Bato was the author
   He was a fine constructor, really never knew
   The bugger was a builder

   Oh, the cabin in the wata
   Mister Bato was the author
   I knew he was a diver, but I never knew
   The bugger was a builder

The Mistress at the National Park
Mr. Bato said it was a rumor;
She decided to take a walk,
Lo and behold: a cabin in the wata.

The lady was getting hot
When she saw the cabin in the sea
Jumping like red beans boiling in pot,
And she tell him must pull it down immediately.

The building was quite erect,
Imagine it was standing in the sea!
The lady called him an architect
“¡But you going to pull it down immediately!”

Now they come to a big dispute,
Bato said, “Me born in Costa Rica.”
“You could a born in Ethiopia
Me no want no cabin in the wata.”

Kiaky Brown was telling me
About the Cabin in the wata:
“Bato build something in the sea,
Must be build it with the devil and he daughter.”

   Oh, the cabin in the wata
   Mister Bato was the author
   He was a fine constructor, really never knew
   The bugger was a builder

   Oh, the cabin in the wata
   Mister Bato was the author
   I knew he was a diver, but I never knew
   The bugger was a builder

Me and Sam McGee

My Godfather, Jim, recites this poem (or at least the gist of the poem) almost any time we're together. It is a story that I and anyone who has know Jim has grown up with, and one that I aspire to memorize some day.

The Cremation of Sam McGee
by Robert W. Service

     There are strange things done in the midnight sun
     By the men who moil for gold;
     The Arctic trails have their secret tales
     That would make your blood run cold;
     The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
     But the queerest they ever did see
     Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
     I cremated Sam McGee.

Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows.
Why he left his home in the South to roam ‘round the Pole, God only knows.
He was always cold, but the land of gold seemed to hold him like a spell;
Though he’d often say in his homely way that “he’d sooner live in hell.”

On a Christmas Day we were mushing our way over the Dawson trail.
Talk of your cold! through the parka’s fold it stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we’d close, then the lashes froze till sometimes we couldn’t see;
It wasn’t much fun, but the only one to whimper was Sam McGee.

And that very night, as we lay packed tight in our robes beneath the snow,
And the dogs were fed, and the stars o’erhead were dancing heel and toe,
He turned to me, and “Cap,” says he, “I’ll cash in this trip, I guess;
And if I do, I’m asking that you won’t refuse my last request.”

Well, he seemed so low that I couldn’t say no; then he says with a sort of moan:
“It’s the cursed cold, and it’s got right hold till I’m chilled clean through to the bone.
Yet ‘taint being dead--it’s my awful dread of the icy grave that pains;
So I want you to swear that, foul or fair, you’ll cremate my last remains.”

A pal’s last need is a thing to heed, so I swore I would not fail;
And we started on at the streak of dawn; but God! he looked ghastly pale.
He crouched on the sleigh, and he raved all day of his home in Tennessee;
And before nightfall a corpse was all that was left of Sam McGee.

There wasn’t a breath in that land of death, and I hurried, horror-driven,
With a corpse half hid that I couldn’t get rid, because of a promise given;
It was lashed to the sleigh, and it seemed to say: “You may tax your brawn and brains,
But you promised true, and it’s up to you to cremate those last remains.”

Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code.
In the days to come, though my lips were dumb, in my heart how I cursed that load.
In the long, long night, by the lone firelight, while the huskies, round in a ring,
Howled out their woes to the homeless snows—O God! how I loathed the thing.

And every day that quiet clay seemed to heavy and heavier grow;
And on I went, though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low;
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
And I’d often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin.

Till I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge, and a derelict there lay;
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice it was called the “Alice May.”
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit, and I looked at my frozen chum;
Then “Here,” said I, with a sudden cry, “is my cre-ma-tor-eum.”

Some planks I tore from the cabin floor, and I lit the boiler fire;
Some coal I found that was lying around, and I heaped the fuel higher;
The flames just soared, and the furnace roared—such a blaze you seldom see;
And I burrowed a hole in the glowing coal, and I stuffed in Sam McGee.

Then I made a hike, for I didn’t like to hear him sizzle so;
And the heavens scowled, and the huskies howled, and the wind began to blow.
It was icy cold, but the hot sweat rolled down my cheeks, and I don’t know why;
And the greasy smoke in an inky cloak went streaking down the sky.

I do not know how long in the snow I wrestled with grisly fear;
But the stars came out and they danced about ere again I ventured near;
I was sick with dread, but I bravely said: “I’ll just take a peep inside.
I guess he’s cooked, and it’s time I looked;” . . . then the door I opened wide.

And there sat Sam, looking cool and calm, in the heart of the furnace roar;
And he wore a smile you could see a mile, and he said: “Please close that door.
It’s fine in here, but I greatly fear you’ll let in the cold and storm—
Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it’s the first time I’ve been warm.”

     There are strange things done in the midnight sun
     By the men who moil for gold;
     The Arctic trails have their secret tales
     That would make your blood run cold;
     The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
     But the queerest they ever did see
     Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
     I cremated Sam McGee.