Yayi- Somos o no somos?

Woman's Nkisi has traditionally been for Fertility, Ease of Childbirth and Healthy Children.  Taino Female Cemis are also about Fertility and Children.  These Nkisi and Cemis are concerned with the Continuation of Life, which is the Vital Life Force of all People and is the Vital Life Force upon this Earth, within this Cosmic-Earthly Circumference that we find ourselves within.

Long before Humanity walked this Sacred Spherical Earth and much longer before someone decided to say that women came from the rib of man, the tiny organisms of life in the Oceans were reproducing, ensuring the next generation and the evolution of life.  The first organisms reproduced by simply replicating their DNA and dividing in half, a process that I (with a background in biology) as a Yayi suggest is a more reflective of female Ovums than male Sperms.  Ovums provide the "UNIVERSE"with its own snake of DNA into which the Sperm brings its complimentary snake of DNA.

In the depths of the Heart of this Continent in the Amazon, the practices of Ayahuasca have been practiced for millennia.  In the Ayahuasca ceremony two plants are used, the Banisteriopsis caapi  (Ayahuasca) Vine and the Psychotria viridis (Chacruna) Leaf.  Some describe the action of these two plants as the snake of the Chacruna penetrating the snake of the Ayahuasca producing Spiritual Visions!  From a scientific stand point there is an active ingredient in the Chacruna that is destroyed by the digestive system unless combined with a second compound in the Ayahuasca.  This potent combination allows the journey into the spiritual and biological foundation of life itself.

To demote the Yayi within Palo to a lesser role in any way is to bring ignorance to the Tradition.  A Yayi is just as powerfully equipped with Spiritual Power, Spiritual Vision and Spiritual Wisdom as the Tata, and has a rightful role to be just as active within the working of the Nkisi.  In many Munansos the Yayi is given a lesser role simply as a tactic of "power over"- a way to disempower the Yayi.  Some Paleros even suggest that Yayi's menstrual blood is "evil" and "bad", forgetting that the menstrual blood is what enable him to develop from a fertilized egg to a fetus, to a baby and to have children himself!

In our Munanso, the Yayi is as empowered as the Tata.  Here we can see various views of the Women's Nkisi Munanso which has a forest garden with various (mostly native) plants, seen above and below.  The plant above is Oswego Tea (Monarda) with both culinary and medicinal uses and used extensively by Indigenous People of this continent where it grows profusely.  The Munanso structure itself is built from trees from the Land itself with the gaps filled with a mixture of straw and mud.  An extension was built using stucco.  This Munanso is the home of multiple female Nkisi.

Various spaces around the Munanso are used for bringing the Nkisi out to absorb Sunlight and Moonlight, and as well for certain ceremonies.  Here vines wrap around the trees at the edge of the clearing.

Below Wild Ginger is a native spreading ground cover we brought into the forest garden.  Its rhizomes can be used for cooking (ginger flavor).

Below is Golden Seal, well known powerful medicinal, native to this region and used by Indigenous People here.  It became over harvested during colonialism and no longer covers the forest floors.  However, when re-introduced it grows well.  At one point the forests of this continent were more diverse but due to the abuse and ignorance brought upon them by greed and recklessness, they are in need of our contributions in terms of bringing back the diversity.  In the Women's Munanso's forest garden we are concerned with making this contribution as well as providing plants to be utilized medicinally, to eat and for spiritual purposes.

Below is a powerful women's herb, Black Cohosh.  This is a powerful herb used by generations to strengthen labor.

Sweet woodruff is a sweetly scented herb and groundcover, it is native to Europe and North Africa.

Remembering the Ayahuasca and Chacruna as a potent combination giving rise to profound vision and spirit, remembering the Ovum and Sperm as a potent combination giving rise to Life, and knowing that it is the female Universe (Ovum, Placenta, Uterus) that nourishes this Life, and it is the female "Milk" that provides Divine Nutrition to the growing baby, we state as fact that the Yayi is an ESSENTIAL component within a Healthy Munanso and is ESSENTIAL to the continuing Evolution of the Spiritual Traditions.  To negate or diminish the Yayi is to diminish the Tradition.

This fact has been shown within our Munanso, as the space for the Female Nkisis was created, the contribution brought forth by them was greatly enhanced and this contribution benefited the "whole" of the Munanso, the "whole" Family opening new pathways.  An example of this that we are willing to "share" is the Munanso Garden, which has brought more magic into the Munanso space as well as bringing a contribution to Mother Earth and us all.

Returning to Women's Nkisi and Women's Cemis and the Fertility and Ease of Childbirth and Healthy Children, we must also track along side the disempowerment of women within Palo, the disempowerment of women in the area unique to women, Pregnancy and Childbirth.  Traditionally women gave birth with the midwife at "home" where the power of the Nkisi and Cemi were utilized to empower and protect this process.  There was no "pain medication" other than herbs, no "inductions" other than herbs such as cohosh, no fetal monitoring other than the midwife's expert hands, and childbirth was "raw" and in this rawness childbirth empowered the women and was a true rite of passage.  Now women place themselves in the hands of institutions and a medical system that regards pregnancy as a disease, women give birth on their backs in disempowerment, frightened due to the scare tactics of the system, and in this country 32% get their uterus sliced open so the baby can come out, told that their uterus is not strong enough to push the baby out or their pelvis to small to allow the baby through, in other words they are not good enough, strong enough or competent enough to give birth, giving rise to a generation of babies born through a procedure that the women's body interprets as a violent attack, not a health giving process.  Birth pain is the only pain that is telling us something good is happening (a baby entering) and is not warning us of something wrong in the body.  The Nkisi and Cemis empowers women to trust and align with the power inherent in life that gives rise to all life, to trust and align with Mother Earth in those Rite of Passage Moments.

Above and Below, two faces of Nkisi, one African, one Taino, both powerful!

Somos o no somos!!!

Article by the Yayi of this Munanso.

Mama Chola's whispered Stories

Water is the Mother of Life upon this Planet, and our evolutionary process rises out from the Primordial Oceans to then walk upon the Land.  Although we left our watery "homeland" (in terms of the Evolutionary Process and in terms of our Birthing from our Mother's Womb), we continue to submerge ourselves in water on a daily basis.  We have the ability to swim, dive, and float upon the waters, in both River and Ocean, and when we do this we are entering a more Ancient World in terms of our Story.  

In the terms of our Mother's Womb, we need to understand that this Womb is much more than a simple sack of fluid in our Mother's Uterus.  Womb is a manifestation on a microcosmic level of the Macrocosmic Maternal Womb of all life.  Our Mother's Womb is a doorway from that Cosmic World to this particular experience upon and within Mother Earth.  Our Mother's Womb holds the power to carry us through a whole process of evolution from a tiny embryo, through stages where we appear like Ocean Creatures, to the formation of the Fetus and recognizable human features.  Our Mother's protective Medicine Pouch (Placenta) is a defense and a nurturer for our process of incarnation, coming from the World of the Ancestors to the World of the so called "Living".  In Taino Understanding the Lagoon is the entry way/ passage way to the World of the Ancestors.  We also place clear containers of Water for the Fundamento, we go through much effort to make Spiritual Baths which are primarily Water, and we utilize water to refreshen all kinds of situations.  


To us in this Munanso we find it offensive when some Paleros describe the Woman's Menstrual Cycle as a weakness, and describe Yayis as weak because of this.  We have also heard Tainos say that women cannot be "Medicine People" and cannot be involved with the Medicine at all.  In terms of Taino this ignorant statement contradicts one of the powerful Taino Myths regarding a powerful Medicine Woman named "Guabonita" who taught the Casike "Guahayona"  the secrets of the Medicine.  In terms of Life itself these ignorant misconceptions contradict the evidence that Life herself continually gives us, demonstrating the power of the Woman's Menstrual Cycle and the Power of Woman's ability to Nurture and Give Birth to new Life.

When entering any body of water, whether it be Ocean, Lake, River, Waterfall, Lagoon, we need to recognize that we are entering manifestations of our Mother's Womb and that we are entering manifestations of Mother Earth's Womb that has given birth to Life in all the diversity that we enjoy from her.  Waters should never have become dumping grounds either physically or spiritually, yet today they have become both.  When we walked to this (relatively) pristine River, we were immediately struck by her Golden Color and how her Waters were the texture and color of Honey.  The Waters were clear and we could see to the bottom where many Misterios looked back at us.  We were able to submerge ourselves in her cool waters, refreshening in ways that are never possible using indoor plumbing.  In some parts we saw many tiny fish.

In all these photos many Spirits are easily visible, some fierce, some ancient, some beyond what we may even recognize.  And it is important to note that it is the currents of the River that has moulded the expressions of the Spirits that become visible upon the stones.  She has "revealed" them, if you will.  Our Ancient Taino Ancestors carved Cemis from Stones, revealing the Spirit that had been "hidden" in the Stone or piece of Wood.  In this sense Mama Chola is the carver of the Cemis that are found within her.  The photo below clearly shows the face of a Spirit looking directly at us.  In giving this some contemplation, we realize that Mama Chola, the Spirit of the River, is creating "Medicine".  

On the particular day that we came to this River, we had been hearing a Palero, who will remain unnamed, speaking on the internet about how Yayis are weak because their menstrual cycle, and talk too much, and that Yayis are not even allowed in some Munansos.  In our walk to the River, the River herself spoke to us, not through the internet, but through her Waters, her Stones, and the glimpses that she gave us into her world.  We need to consider the historical facts of colonialism of our Matri-focal cultures by paternalistic aggressive western mentalities.  These onslaughts of colonialism with its genocide and enslavement of our Peoples, left its scars that we are still struggling to heal from.  The most dangerous of those scars are the ones that we do not even realize are scars because of the scar tissue of ignorance that covers them.  The degrading of women and the describing of the Powerful Cycle that allows our Human Experience (the Menstrual Cycle) as weak is  one of the scars of colonialism and genocide that still haunts us.  

Other schools of thought blur the line of the Menstrual Cycle and try to attempt to give it a function with the Man, which is yet another scar from colonialism.  Some Tainos (who will remain unnamed) depict "Guakar", a female Misterio relating to the Menstrual Cycle of Women, as a masculine force.  This is another psychological scar that still seeks to undermine the Power of Mother, the Power of the Menstrual, the Power of the Mother giving Birth!


For those who have never read Willie Lynch's speech to his fellow slave owners,  we suggest reading it for a better understanding of the psychic attack that we as a Culture, as a People, as Communities and as Families, as Women and as Children and as Men endured and continue to endure.   Note that the individual "Willie Lynch" is described as a slave owner in the West Indies giving a speech to slave owners in Virginia on how to keep control and power over their 'slaves'.   We also suggest reading "The Dark Side of Christian History" by Helen Ellerbe for a deeper understanding of the energies within Christianity, the same Christianity that was forced upon our Indigenous ways through violence and psychic attacks.  It is important not to turn a blind eye to the story of the past, because it is only through facing the stories of the past that we can detoxify our mental bodies in the present and break free from our mental enslavement.  

Many within our Traditions come to the River to address "love issues", issues between Women and Men, issues of Marriage, and issues of fertility.  This is of course very appropriate.  We come bringing the River honey to sweeten these relationships in our lives, to open up energies of healthy relationships and love, and this is wonderful and good.  The River will take us as deeply into these trails as we are willing to "dive", and when we dive below the surface of our "apparent" need, we find the stories of our Ancestors vibrating within her waters, taking us to much more profound levels concerning our "issue with love, relationship and fertility".  We have seen the River enable Children to be Born to so called "infertile" parents, we have seen the River heal tumultuous relationships, we have seen the River open up doorways for relationships of love.  We have also seen how the River always has a deeper story to tell to us, if we are willing to listen, because these issues are never just a phenomenon of the present, they are trails linking to the Ancient Past, and the trails are not often nearly as beautiful as the River appears on this day.  

With all her beauty when flowing through a bright, clear summer's day, we have to also remember the tumultuous, debris ridden raging aspect of her that appears from rains from storms, and recognize that we are not dealing with a split personality, where we can relate to one without relating to the other, we are interrelating with a whole Mpungo, a whole Entity, and we offend that Mpungo when we look at her from limited perspectives, just as we offend the Mother of Life when we look at her daughters from limited perspectives, calling Yayis weak and indicating Yayis lack discipline.  Rape is rampant upon this Earth and is used as a weapon of war, globally.  In terms of the "homeland" of our tradition, Kongo, we see that every day hundreds of Women, Girls and Babies are raped, and this is certainly not the only place Women are being raped on daily basis.  Violence is used against the Mother's of Life and on a minute, yet significant, level when Tata's find themselves speaking down about Yayis, this violence is perpetuated further, and when women are sidelined and told they cannot "learn the Medicine" again this violence continues.  Some claim it is "tradition" but that has to be examined closely and the legacy of colonialism and its christianity, both on the African continent prior to the Atlantic slave trade, and on this continent, needs to be factored in as a real pollutant of our "Traditions".   Once we recognize it as the pollutant that it is, we can break our  enslavement in the most important place, and that is within our Spirituality.