EAGLE BEACH — A new way to experience wellness has arrived on Eagle Beach, and Aruba residents are invited to be part of it. Starting this week, Bucuti & Tara Beach Resort unveils its most extensive wellness program yet, from 1 to 6 guided wellness experiences offered every day. The expanded schedule gives locals even more opportunities to prioritize their wellbeing, with experiences ranging from Restorative Yoga and Aromatherapy Workshop to Dance Yoga Flow, mindful ceremonies, Chakra Alignment and interactive wellness sessions.

Bucuti & Tara is also continuing its special Dollar-to-Florin promotion for Aruba residents, making it even more accessible for the local community to experience the resort’s expanding wellness program and incorporate more intentional moments of movement, mindfulness, and wellbeing into everyday life.

“We have always believed wellness is much more than visiting a spa or joining a yoga class,” said Crescenzia Biemans, Managing Director of Bucuti & Tara Beach Resort. “True wellness is regenerative. It restores not only the individual, but also our connection with each other, with nature, with the local community, and with ourselves. As we expand our wellness program, it is important to us that our local community can be part of this journey and experience these moments of movement, restoration and connection right here in Aruba.”

More Ways to Prioritize Wellbeing, Every Day

With 1 to 6 wellness experiences available daily, the expanded schedule makes it possible to choose an experience that suits different interests, energy levels and wellness goals.

The program brings together Bucuti & Tara’s wellness specialists and local instructors for a diverse collection of experiences.

Some experiences energize the body through movement, mobility and strength. Others create space for stillness, mindfulness and connection through meditation, sound, ceremonies and small-group gatherings.

Together, the expanded schedule allows participants to make wellness their own, whether that means starting the morning moving on Eagle Beach, improving strength and mobility, discovering a new mindfulness practice or simply creating time to slow down and reset.

More Than a Class: A Complete Wellness Experience

The transformation goes beyond adding more classes to the schedule.

Bucuti & Tara has reimagined each session as a more complete wellness experience, beginning from the moment participants arrive.

Each experience opens with a thoughtfully selected beverage designed to complement the session ahead. Following the experience, refreshing cold towels and locally sourced herbal teas create a gentle transition from movement or mindfulness into restoration.

These added touches turn a traditional one-hour class into an opportunity to disconnect from the day’s routine, reconnect with oneself and enjoy the peaceful natural surroundings of Eagle Beach.

A Broader Vision of Wellness

The expanded classes are part of a much larger wellness vision taking shape at Bucuti & Tara.

Also launching this September are new private wellness retreats tailored to different life moments and individual wellbeing aspirations. Expecting parents can celebrate a babymoon through floating meditation, mindful rituals and restorative treatments, while couples can reconnect through private breathwork, couples yoga and bespoke wellness experiences.

Across the resort, this same philosophy extends to Purun Spa, the 24-hour Fitness Center and health-conscious dining at Elements Restaurant. It can also be found in the locally inspired cuisine of Terra by Jeremy Ford, wellness and lifestyle products at Seráfina Boutique, and access to specialized medical wellness services through carefully selected local partners.

Connecting Wellness with Aruba’s Natural Environment

This new chapter is only the beginning.

Future developments will continue expanding the resort’s wellness facilities, spa experiences and immersive, regenerative nature-based programming centered around the Bucuti Tara – GMC Nature Preserve, the resort’s 32-acre conservation area.

Planned experiences include guided meditation in nature, contemplative nature walks and sound healing surrounded by native landscapes, along with opportunities that deepen participants’ connection with Aruba’s unique flora, fauna and natural environment.

“This launch is only the beginning,” added Biemans. “Our vision is to become one of the world’s leading wellness destinations by continually creating experiences that restore people, celebrate Aruba’s unique character, and leave a lasting positive impact on the destination we call home.”

With wellness, romance and sustainability forming the three pillars of the Bucuti & Tara experience, the resort continues expanding the ways both visitors and the local community can experience meaningful wellbeing in Aruba.

To explore the wellness schedule and learn more, visit Bucuti.com.

Late last year the U.S. Justice Department created a unit tasked with fighting online scam networks that use cryptocurrency, are based in Southeast Asia and operate on behalf of presumed Chinese crime gangs.

The unit’s latest actions included taking down the Telegram channels of Xinbi Guarantee, a scamming marketplace, and seizing $52 million in crypto money, Jeanne Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, told a news conference Wednesday.

“Shinby Marketplace has over 650,000 users. It’s housed on Telegram, and it’s where vendors market their services to scam ops,” Pirro added.

This includes creating custom scam investment and laundering websites, she said.

The U.S. Treasury simultaneously announced sanctions against Shinbi Guarantee, which was already hit by British sanctions, and two entities that support its activities.

“It should be no surprise these networks are spreading across the globe,” Pirro said. “They’re no longer just centered in Southeast Asia. They now operate in hubs across Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Central America.”

She said over the past two weeks U.S. investigators had gone to Madagascar, a country in the Indian Ocean off the east coast of Africa, to help take down 13 scam centers run by Chinese citizens. This led to the arrest of 500 scammers, she said.

The Madagascar justice ministry said this week that “a first wave” of 50 Chinese citizens were sent back home after being convicted in Madagascar of crimes related to online scams.

The ministry insisted these people were not simply freed but rather will serve prison sentences in China ranging from two to 10 years, depending on whether they were lower-level or bosses in the scam activities.

The Chinese embassy in Madagascar said 50 Chinese citizens were in fact sent home from that African country and it praised what it called judicial cooperation between the two nations.

The U.S. Justice Department said these 50 people were tried and convicted in Madagascar as part of the campaign discussed by Pirro.

Several countries in Southeast Asia, like Myanmar and Cambodia, are known to be home to vast online scam centers using forced labor by people of many nationalities, often citizens of China.

Pirro said revenue taken in by these sprawling facilities is estimated at $40 billion a year, including $12 billion from duped Americans.

The two-day gathering, dubbed “Trumpapalooza,” is designed to persuade the Republican leader’s supporters that he is effectively on the ballot on November 3, when Republicans risk losing the House of Representatives and face a fierce fight to retain the Senate.

“So what I really want you to do is pretend, please, that I’m on the ballot,” Trump said recently at a rally in South Carolina. “Just come and vote. It’s so important.”

Decision Desk HQ projects Democrats to win the House 230-205 and the Senate to finish 51-49 in their favor — revising its 50-50 prediction as the outlook continues to worsen for Republicans.

Trump, whose approval rating stood at just 33 percent in recent polling, will speak on both convention nights at the American Airlines Center.

His challenge is to mobilize voters personally loyal to him without further alienating independents already souring on his presidency amid inflation woes, gasoline prices topping $4 a gallon and the continuing war with Iran.

“Many Trump supporters only vote when he’s on the ballot,” Matthew Green, a politics professor at the Catholic University of America, told AFP.

“They’re not diehard Republican voters; they’re diehard Trump voters. So, in that respect, it makes some sense to feature Trump in the hopes of getting those folks to turn out in November.”

But Green was skeptical that asking those supporters to imagine Trump on their ballots could overcome his broader weakness.

“When you’re in the low- to mid-30s, that’s traditionally associated with a very bad midterm for your party,” he said of the 80-year-old’s approval ratings.

– Trump show –

The gathering is the first Republican national convention held specifically for a midterm election, although no candidates will be nominated and no formal party business is planned.

Instead, organizers have constructed what amounts to a two-night television rally touting Trump’s record and Republican candidates.

More than 100 House members and candidates are expected, with over 50 speakers or presentations scheduled each night.

Trump delivers Wednesday’s keynote and returns for Thursday’s finale after Vice President JD Vance speaks. Cabinet members, congressional leaders and candidates in closely watched House and Senate races are also on the program.

Republicans plan to highlight tax cuts, immigration enforcement, manufacturing and prescription drug prices, while depicting Democrats as dangerously far to the left.

Some Republicans, however, are privately hoping Trump sticks to that script rather than the personal grievances and off-message subjects that regularly dominate his appearances.

– Staying home –

Not everyone is coming.

Numerous lawmakers in competitive races have decided that, less than two months from Election Day, their time is better spent campaigning at home.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has acknowledged the dilemma, saying some members need to remain home because it is a “critical time” immediately before early voting accelerates nationwide.

And even Trump’s promised national television showcase faces an unusually formidable rival. Both convention nights coincide with the opening games of the NFL season.

“Spending three or four days away from your district to go to a convention is not a good way to spend your time if you’re facing a tight re-election,” Green added.

Democrats were also making their presence felt in Dallas, with the party sending out some of its most high-profile speakers for public events.

“Americans are being crushed by rising costs,” Colorado Congressman Jason Crow posted on X.

“Republicans don’t care — they’re in Dallas, celebrating an out of touch President whose tariffs and wars are making things worse. We’re going to hold them accountable.”

Etnia Nativa:Yourpeek into Nativemagic, healing the spirit.

Article by Etnia Nativa call us 592 2702 and book your experience!

Long before modern Aruba took shape, the island’s rocks, water, soils, and vegetation were already shaping the lives, traditions, and settlements of its Indigenous inhabitants.

Each week, in this cultural space, Etnia Nativa—one of Aruba’s leading guardians of the island’s cultural heritage—invites readers to journey through the history, identity, and living traditions that have shaped the Aruban spirit across generations.

In this latest edition, Etnia Nativa explores how this ancient relationship between people and place comes to life through Aruba’s distinctive geology. Across Santa Cruz, Tanki Flip, Noord, Alto Vista, and Savaneta, landscapes shaped largely by quartz diorite created a rugged terrain of rocky outcrops, dry riverbeds, and deep rainwater gutters known as rooi (rôôy). Yet these seemingly harsh landscapes also offered valuable resources. Since quartz diorite is relatively impermeable, where water was retained in the soils above the rock, creating pockets of fertile land where vegetation and crops could flourish.

For our Aruban Indigenous inhabitants, these geological features were far more than elements of the landscape. They formed part of a living environment that influenced where people settled, how they cultivated the land, and how they adapted to the island’s distinctive natural conditions.

Yet perhaps nowhere is Aruba’s geological identity more striking than at Hooiberg—the island’s iconic volcanic cone rising from its centerup to 166 meters above sea level, Hooiberg stands boldly above the surrounding landscape—a timeless monument to the forces of the Earth. Its distinctive form is composed primarily of hooibergite, a rare rock named to the hill, closely associated with Aruba and this geological region.

Hooibergite, together with other ancient rocks such as gabbro found in Aruba’s northern hills, forms part of Aruba’s ancient batholithic landscape, referred to as the Aruba Lava Formation. Weathering and erosion over millions of years gradually sculpted the immense geological foundation into the hills, valleys, boulder formations, and waterways that shaped the island we know today.

This ancient rocky landscape also shaped the lives of the Indigenous people, who learned to live in harmony with the island and its geological environment. For them, the landscape was more than just geology. They lived closely connected to the Earth and learned to read its signs and understand how to use the land. Through knowledge, observation, and experience, they knew where to live, where to plant, and where to fish. This was their main technology when it came to survival and living sustainably. They thrived by being one with their environment. Their settlements show how carefully they read the land—and how the land, in turn, provided what they needed.

Perhaps the most extraordinary connection between Aruba’s ancient inhabitants and the quartz diorite landscape is found in the island’s rock art.

Pictographs and petroglyphs—painted and carved images left on stone—are frequently found on quartz diorite boulders. Many of these sites make use of natural cavities on the sheltered, leeward sides of rocks.

These cavities were themselves created by the slow chemical weathering of the stone over immense stretches of time.Here, geology and human expression meet.

A natural opening in a boulder became a place for images. A rock became a canvas. The landscape became a setting for cultural and spiritual expression.

Of Aruba’s seventeen known rock art sites, twelve are located within the quartz diorite landscape.

That concentration is difficult to ignore.

It suggests that these areas were significant not only as places to live and cultivate food, but also as places where knowledge, ceremony, creativity could be expressed but also where the spirits were traditionally presents

The stones, in a very literal sense, became part of Aruba’s cultural memory.

Rediscovering the Soul of Aruba

Today, it is easy to travel across Aruba and admire the scenery of hills on the horizon, dry riverbeds, a weathered boulder, a few patches of fertile soil and the rest covered by xenophiles and cactus. However, look more closely, and the landscape begins to tell another its story.

The rooi`s speak of ancient waters. The beaches of an abundant sea

The soil speaks of agriculture. Of corn beans squashes and yuca

The rocks speak of geology.Beautiful clay pottery and green stones

The archaeological sites speak of settlement and our ancestors.

In addition, the petroglyphs and pictographs speak of a people whose relationship with this island extended beyond survival into culture, identity and spirituality.

Together, these elements reveal an Aruba that existed long before colonial influence—a living landscape shaped by nature and given meaning by generations of indigenous inhabitants.

This is the perspective that Etnia Nativa encourages visitors to explore—not simply an Aruba to see, but an Aruba to understand. It is an opportunity to pause, connect with the land, and consider the stories rooted in it.

These stories offer another way to experience the island, bringing together its geology, archaeology, heritage, and living cultural memory. Understanding a place goes beyond what can be seen; it also means paying attention to the land beneath our feet and the history it carries.Book your visit today:WhatsApp+297 592 2702 etnianativa03@gmail.com

(Oranjestad)— Standing proudly and always pointing west, the Watapana (also called Divi Divi—though some say erroneously so) played an important role in one of the island’s first industries. Since then, it has been recognized as Aruba’s national tree. Here are some facts about the sturdy Watapana.

The Watapana name comes from the indigenous word “Guatapana” and is a symbol of hope and resilience. The Watapana grows in the direction of the wind; that’s why you will always see a Watapana pointing west.

The name ‘Divi Divi’ originated in Curacao during the 17th century when Watapana beans were exported from the Antilles to Europe to produce dye. The fruit of the Watapana contains tannin, a chemical compound that naturally produces a dye that was used for tanning leather back then.

In Aruba, the tannin industry gave manylocals temporary work. Watapana beans were collected and taken to the cunucu* owner in exchange for 25 cents for every 20 kilos. After collecting the beans, workers would have to pick out the best ones for exportation: Deep red pods were preferred; green or black pods were considered premature or damaged. The end of the tannin industry in Aruba faded out with the introduction of synthetic dyes. This proved to be a much cheaper option than processing tannin.

In 1979, the Watapana was inaugurated as Aruba’s national tree.

*Cunucu: Land used for food cultivation and herd farming.

Source: Chabalito magazine – E Watapana (2010)