Rais.cw Fundashon Famia, Núkleo di Bario

Zakitó (including Parasasa)

Sisters and lepers at Zakito Photo from the Andre Rancuret collection
Zakito seen from the south – former front of the building, facing the lagoon
Zakito Mural at the walking strip Photo Arnout Stratingh
Zakito complex seen from the north
Zakito area with walking strip photo Curaçao Tourist Board
Guard house at Koredor Photo Curaçao Tourist Board
Former location of salt pans, with residential towers in the background – photo Carel de Haseth
Two of the five residential towers under construction at the Zakito lagoon – photo Ieteke Witteveen
Entrance to the little cemetery at Zakito – photo Christel Monsanto
Beach facilities at koredor photo Curaçao Tourist Board
pavilion at the left front of the main building
patio with little chapel
Parasasa, with salt pans, and Zakito in 1911 on the Werbata map
East side main building
Mural at koredor at Zakito
Man-made beach at Parasasa
The leper asylum Photo from the Andre Rancuret collection
Graves at the Zakito complex in 2016 photo Christel Monsanto
The former little rooms of lepers later became offices of the GGD
The koredor at Zakito – photo Carel de Haseth
Curaçaosche Courant -1881, tender for construction of the leper asylum

Zakitó (including Parasasa)

From the high-lying Zjaro, which is actually the middle terrace of the Rif, you have the most beautiful view over the whole Rif area as far as Zakitó.

The former kunuku Zakitó lies south of Plantersrust and was officially called "Inzicht" but is named after the then landowner: the Historisch Archief reports on its website that he was called Isaak Chapman, known in everyday speech as "Zaqui" or "Zaquitó". The government bought this terrain in 1880 to set up a leper and lunatic asylum here, after the former accommodation at Rif, the Lazarushuis, had been destroyed by a hurricane. The new building was taken into use in 1882, and in the end the name Zakitó stayed attached to the former leprosy institution. It is situated west of the present head office of the daily newspaper Extra on the Helmin Magno Wiels Boulevard.

Lazarus disease

Leprosy, "melaatsheid" or Lazarus disease, was already known in antiquity. Symptoms include patches on the skin, thickenings under the skin and swellings and sores on the face. The disease can lead to severe deformities of, among other things, the limbs and the face and was contagious, which is why the patients were isolated.

The name Lazarus lives on in Lazareno, an old name for the residential district west of Zakitó.

Zakitó

The leprosy asylum at Zakitó was a spacious, airy and fairly efficiently arranged building complex that was modernised in 1936. Among other things, each patient then got their own room with bathroom and toilet, a layout that can still be clearly seen now.

In 1945 Zakitó, with 35 patients, reached its largest number of lepers. There were then six nursing Sisters from Breda.

GGD

With progress in the medical world leprosy could be treated more quickly and effectively. On 9 November 1966 Zakitó was therefore closed as an institution with the celebration of a Holy Mass in the little chapel built in the complex.

Only the graves of leprosy patients on the terrain still recall Zakitó's past. The head office of the Geneeskundige en Gezondheidsdienst, the GGD (Medical and Public Health Service), was afterwards housed in the complex for years.

Across from the complex lies the inner water, or the Laguna di Zakitó, on whose banks a large tourist complex consisting of six residential towers is now being built.

According to John de Pool, the lagoon and the area around it formerly counted as a popular romantic attraction. Couples in love strolled here on the road to Plantersrust or sailed at full moon in gondolas over the inner water, often accompanied by music.

The lagoon runs from the KAE water and electricity plant to the beach at Parasasa near the World Trade Center.

Parasasa

The former plantation Parasasa is an area south of Seru Pretu. Seru di Parasasa is the hill slope between Zjaro on the one hand and the lagoon of Zakitó and the sea on the other. Parasasa was bought around 1850 by the government — read governor baron van Raders — with the associated Saliña di Parasasa, alias the "Baki di Salu". Residents of Zjaro used to collect salt here for household use, and clothes were also washed. These salt pans lie in the south of the lagoon, between the end of the running strip and the beach of Parasasa. For a long time they were no longer visible because of the mangrove growth but have now entirely disappeared through the construction of the tourist residential towers at Zakitó.

USS Erie

During the Second World War, on 12 November 1942 to be precise, a tragedy took place east of Parasasa Beach. There, just off the coast, the American warship USS Erie was torpedoed by a German submarine. Seven crew members did not survive the disaster, eleven were seriously wounded and the material damage was enormous.

Because it had ultimately ended up in shallow water, the ship did not sink and kept burning for days. It was then towed to the Schottegat, where it was sunk on 5 December 1942.

Sources

  • de Pool: Del Curaçao que se va
  • Nationaal Archief Curaçao: Het leprozengesticht te Zaquitó
  • National Archaeological Anthropological Memory Management (NAAM Foundation), Curaçao: Bureauonderzoek Zakitó area tbv CTB, April 2022

With thanks to André Rancuret, Arnout Stratingh, Carel de Haseth, François van der Hoeven, Christel Monsanto, Frensel Mercelina, CTB and the Centraal Historisch Archief.