Confronting a Legend: Guyana's Kaieteur Falls

Kaieteur Falls from ieishah clelland on Vimeo.

"[Poet AJ] Seymour's "Legend of Kaieteur" has it that Kai was the chief of the Patamoona Amerindian tribe. According to local legend, a neighboring tribe, the Caribisi, suddenly waged war on the Patamoona. When the destruction of his tribe seemed imminent, Kai went to Mokonaima Falls (also spelled Makanaima), to ask The Great Spirit to save his people. The Great Spirit's messenger-birds return to tell Kai that he must come "before His face for ever". Only in exchange for this will The Great Spirit make sure that no harm comes to the Patamoona. Thus Kai set off into the flood in a "frail boat", neither his body nor his boat seen again. It is said that Kai still sits today looking into the face of The Great Spirit of the Fall, listening to the siren-like voices of the fall's feminine spirits."

This is an excerpt from an essay I wrote it in 2001. I saw Kaieteur Falls for the first time in December 2010. According to another legend Kai was a miserable old man; so unbearable was his character that his own family put him in a boat and pushed him off the falls. In a far more probable tale, it's said that most Guyanese have never seen it.

*Kaieteur is misspelled in the beginning of the vid. Sincere apologies to the great spirits.