Iris Brown

“Good afternoon, my name is Iris, and I would like to welcome you to Colobó. Colobó is a very special garden for us because here we can come and do many different things. However today I am going to dedicate myself to share a few things about Colobó.

First, I would like to start by telling you about Colobó’s design. This is because there is a reason for every nook and cranny of Colobó.  One is here, another is there, and one in the rear.

The one over there is the American Garden. Why do we refer to it as American? Because we have plants such as vegetables, flowers, fruits, and medicinal plants which are all of North American origin. And our curiosity is to see how many of those plants are also found in the Caribbean.

This garden over here represents Puerto Rico. In this garden we also have flowers, medicinal plants, vegetables, along with many different things which represent Puerto Rico.

And over there in the corner we can find our African garden which also houses a variety of plants. Therefore, when we walk from here to there, when we walk from there to over there, and again from here to there, we are actually creating a triangle.

That triangle was very important. This was because the Spaniards, who in reality were Europeans, all from different places in Europe, they travelled from Europe to the Caribbean, stopping in places such as Puerto Rico, The Dominican Republic, Cuba, and all surrounding regions, and afterwards they would return to Africa to find African people to bring back as slave labor, some to the Caribbean and others to the United States.

One of the reasons why we explain it in the way in which we do is to help us understand that we are all the same people, 

in different places, with the same stories. Therefore, why can’t we all just get along? Why do we continue fighting and looking at all sorts of different things? We should focus on our similarities and just how we do in Puerto Rico and in Colobó, 

Let’s celebrate it, together”