A few years ago, I was involved in an attempt to give young Curaçaoans a real place in tourism. The idea was to connect performing arts and entertainment with our own culture. Young people learned how to build instruments that belong to the traditions of Curaçao and how to play them. Some music groups that came out of the project are still performing this repertoire today.
That part makes me proud. But the project never created the lasting connection with tourism that we hoped for. The young performers were meant to play in hotels, where visitors could experience something genuinely Curaçaoan. Unfortunately, the cooperation was not there. Hotel managers showed little interest, and because the project did not go through the tourism board, it may never have received the support it needed.
Our hotels stand on Curaçao, but too often the entertainment inside them could come from anywhere.
The result is that hotels continue to offer visitors generic Caribbean entertainment, such as the familiar limbo shows. There is nothing wrong with enjoying such a show, but it does not tell visitors much about Curaçao. The tourists miss the chance to discover our culture, while local performers miss the chance to earn an income from tourism.
I believe a people must be able to recognise and value its own culture. Yet the hotels are not open enough to what we have to offer. There is very little communication between cultural organisations, young performers, tourism businesses and policymakers.
Take the tumba, for example. It is a form of music and dance with roots going back to the time of slavery. It carries an important part of our history. It is exactly the kind of cultural expression many tourists would be interested to see. Yet we Curaçaoans sometimes behave as if something from outside must automatically be better than something of our own.
If we continue thinking like that, parts of our culture will slowly lose their value, first in our own eyes and then perhaps altogether.
Young people feel this gap, although they do not always express it directly. Events organised especially for them are often poorly attended. Some people interpret that as a lack of interest, but I also see it as a form of silent criticism. When young people do speak, they ask good questions. Why is culture not taught together with tourism at school? Why are they not given proper opportunities to perform for the visitors who come to their island?
We should not speak about young people only as a problem. We should help them discover who they are and give them a place in the island’s future.
The media often present young people as something that needs to be controlled. I think that is unfair, especially at a time when Curaçao is facing both financial and cultural uncertainty. Education has an important task. It must help a generation reconnect with its culture, while also teaching young people how tourism works and how they can participate in it.
There is also a deeper tension between residents and visitors. Some Curaçaoans feel that tourists come mainly to take rather than to exchange. Topless sunbathing has made local people uncomfortable on certain beaches. At other beaches, entrance fees keep many residents away. Residential resorts for foreign winter visitors occupy some of the island’s finest land, while local families increasingly struggle to afford property themselves.
For young people who already feel uncertain about their future here, these developments can make leaving for the Netherlands seem easier than staying.
I am not against tourism. I want tourism to become more firmly connected to the people and culture of Curaçao. I would like us to value the harvest festival and the tumba as much as we value carnival. I would also like tourism policy to treat our culture as its foundation, not as decoration added afterwards.
Tourists want to discover Curaçao. We Curaçaoans must first recognise that our island, our history and our culture are worth discovering.