Читать книгу I, Rigoberta Menchu - Rigoberta Menchu - Страница 9

‘Whoever may ask where we are, tell them what you know of us and nothing more.’

—Popol Vuh

‘Learn to protect yourselves, by keeping our secret.’

—Popol Vuh

In our community there is an elected representative, someone who is highly respected. He’s not a king but someone whom the community looks up to like a father. In our village, my father and mother were the representatives. Well, then the whole community becomes the children of the woman who’s elected. So, a mother, on her first day of pregnancy goes with her husband to tell these elected leaders that she’s going to have a child, because the child will not only belong to them but to the whole community, and must follow as far as he can our ancestors’ traditions. The leaders then pledge the support of the community and say: ‘We will help you, we will be the child’s second parents.’ They are known as abuelos, ‘grandparents’ or ‘forefathers’. The parents then ask the ‘grandparents’ to help them find the child some godparents, so that if he’s orphaned, he shouldn’t be tempted by any of the bad habits our people sometimes fall into. So the ‘grandparents’ and the parents choose the godparents together. It’s also the custom for the pregnant mother’s neighbours to visit her every day and take her little things, no matter how simple. They stay and talk to her, and she’ll tell them all her problems.

Later, when she’s in her seventh month, the mother introduces her baby to the natural world, as our customs tell her to. She goes out in the fields or walks over the hills. She also has to show her baby the kind of life she leads, so that if she gets up at three in the morning, does her chores and tends the animals, she does it all the more so when she’s pregnant, conscious that the child is taking all this in. She talks to the child continuously from the first moment he’s in her stomach, telling him how hard his life will be. It’s as if the mother were a guide explaining things to a tourist. She’ll say, for instance; ‘You must never abuse nature and you must live your life as honestly as I do.’ As she works in the fields, she tells her child all the little things about her work. It’s a duty to her child that a mother must fulfil. And then, she also has to think of a way of hiding the baby’s birth from her other children.

When her baby is born, the mother mustn’t have her other children round her. The people present should be the husband, the village leaders, and the couple’s parents. Three couples. The parents are often away in other places, so if they can’t be there, the husband’s father and the wife’s mother can perhaps make up one pair. If one of the village leaders can’t come, one of them should be there to make up a couple with one of the parents. If none of the parents can come, some aunts and uncles should come to represent the family on both sides, because the child is to be part of the community. The birth of a new member is very significant for the community, as it belongs to the community not just to the parents, and that’s why three couples (but not just anybody) must be there to receive it. They explain that this child is the fruit of communal love. If the village leader is not a midwife as well, another midwife is called (it might be a grandmother) to receive the child. Our customs don’t allow single women to see a birth. But it does happen in times of need. For instance, I was with my sister when she went into labour. Nobody else was at home. This was when we were being heavily persecuted. Well, I didn’t exactly see, but I was there when the baby was born.

My mother was a midwife from when she was sixteen right up to her death at forty-three. She used to say that a woman hadn’t the strength to push the baby out when she’s lying down. So what she did with my sister was to hang a rope from the roof and pull her up, because my brother wasn’t there to lift her up. My mother helped the baby out with my sister in that position. It’s a scandal if an Indian woman goes to hospital and gives birth there. None of our women would agree to that. Our ancestors would be shocked at many of the things which go on today. Family planning, for example. It’s an insult to our culture and a way of swindling the people, to get money out of them.

This is part of the reserve that we’ve maintained to defend our customs and our culture. Indians have been very careful not to disclose any details of their communities, and the community does not allow them to talk about Indian things. I too must abide by this. This is because many religious people have come among us and drawn a false impression of the Indian world. We also find a ladino using Indian clothes very offensive. All this has meant that we keep a lot of things to ourselves and the community doesn’t like us telling its secrets. This applies to all our customs. When the Catholic Action^* arrived, for instance, everyone started going to mass, and praying, but it’s not their only religion, not the only way they have of expressing themselves. Anyway, when a baby is born, he’s always baptized within the community before he’s taken to church. Our people have taken Catholicism as just another channel of expression, not our one and only belief. Our people do the same with other religions. The priests, monks and nuns haven’t gained the people’s confidence because so many of their things contradict our own customs. For instance, they say: ‘You have too much trust in your elected leaders.’ But the village elects them because they trust them, don’t they? The priests say: ‘The trouble is you follow those sorcerers,’ and speak badly of them. But for our people this is like speaking ill of their own fathers, and they lose faith in the priests. They say: ‘Well, they’re not from here, they can’t understand our world.’ So there’s not much hope of winning our people’s hearts.

To come back to the children, they aren’t to know how the baby is born. He’s born somewhere hidden away and only the parents know about it. They are told that a baby has arrived and that they can’t see their mother for eight days. Later on, the baby’s companion, the placenta that is, has to be burned at a special time. If the baby is born at night, the placenta is burned at eight in the morning, and if he’s born in the afternoon, it’ll be burned at five o’clock. This is out of respect for both the baby and his companion. The placenta is not buried, because the earth is the mother and the father of the child and mustn’t be abused by having the placenta buried in it. All these reasons are very important for us. Either the placenta is burned on a log and the ashes left there, or else it is put in the temascal. This is a stove which our people use to make vapour baths. It’s a small hut made of adobe and inside this hut is another one made of stone, and when we want to have a bath, we light a fire to heat the stones, close the door, and throw water on the stones to produce steam. Well, when the woman is about four months pregnant, she starts taking these baths infused with evergreens, pure natural aromas. There are many plants the community uses for pregnant women, colds, headaches, and things like that. So the pregnant mother takes baths with plants prescribed for her by the midwife or the village leader. The fields are full of plants whose names I don’t know in Spanish. Pregnant women use orange and peach leaves a lot for bathing and there’s another one we call Saint Mary’s leaf which they use. The mother needs these leaves and herbs to relax because she won’t be able to rest while she’s pregnant since our women go on working just as hard in the fields. So, after work, she takes this calming bath so that she can sleep well, and the baby won’t be harmed by her working hard. She’s given medicines to take as well. And leaves to feed the child. I believe that in practice (even if this isn’t a scientific recommendation) these leaves work very well, because many of them contain vitamins. How else would women who endure hunger and hard work give birth to healthy babies? I think that these plants have helped our people survive.

The purity with which the child comes into the world is protected for eight days. Our customs say that the newborn baby should be alone with his mother in a special place for eight days, without any of her other children. Her only visitors are the people who bring her food. This is the baby’s period of integration into the family; he very slowly becomes a member of it. When the child is born, they kill a sheep and there’s a little fiesta just for the family. Then the neighbours start coming to visit, and bring presents. They either bring food for the mother, or something for the baby. The mother has to taste all the food her neighbours bring to show her appreciation for their kindness. After the eight days are over, the family counts up how many visitors the mother had, and how many presents were received; things like eggs or food apart from what was brought for the mother, or clothing, small animals, and wood for the fire, or services like carrying water and chopping wood. If, during the eight days, most of the community has called, this is very important, because it means that this child will have a lot of responsibility towards his community when he grows up. The community takes over all the household expenses for these eight days and the family spends nothing.

After eight days everything has been received, and another animal is killed as recognition that the child’s right to be alone with his mother is over. All the mother’s clothes, bedclothes, and everything she used during the birth, are taken away by our elected leader and washed. She can’t wash them in the well, so no matter how far away the river is, they must be carried and washed there. The baby’s purity is washed away and he’s ready to learn the ways of humanity. The mother’s bed is moved to a part of the house which has first been washed with water and lime. Lime is sacred. It strengthens the child’s bones. I believe this really is true. It gives a child strength to face the world. The mother has a bath in the temascal and puts on clean clothes. Then, the whole house is cleaned. The child is also washed and dressed and put into the new bed. Four candles are placed on the corners of the bed to represent the four corners of the house and show him that this will be his home. They symbolize the respect the child must have for his community, and the responsibility he must feel towards it as a member of a household. The candles are lit and give off an incense which incorporates the child into the world he must live in. When the baby is born, his hands and feet are bound to show him that they are sacred and must only be used to work or do whatever nature meant them to do. They must never steal or abuse the natural world, or show disrespect for any living thing.

After the eight days, his hands and feet are untied and he’s now with his mother in the new bed. This means he opens the doors to the other members of the community, because neither the family or the community know him yet. Or rather, they weren’t shown the baby when he was born. Now they can all come and kiss him. The neighbours bring another animal, and there’s a big lunch in the new baby’s house for all the community. This is to celebrate his integration ‘in the universe’, as our parents used to say. Candles will be lit for him and his candle becomes part of the candle of the whole community, which now has one more person, one more member. The whole community is at the ceremony, or at least, if not all of it, then some of it. Candles are lit to represent all the things which belong to the universe–earth, water, sun and man–and the child’s candle is put with them, together with incense (what we call pom) and lime–our sacred lime. Then, the parents tell the baby of the suffering of the family he will be joining. With great feeling, they express their sorrow at bringing a child into the world to suffer. To us, suffering is our fate, and the child must be introduced to sorrows and hardship, but he must learn that despite his suffering, he will be respectful and live through his pain. The child is then entrusted with the responsibility for his community and told to abide by its rules. After the ceremony comes the lunch, and then the neighbours go home. Now, there is only the baptism to come.

When the baby is born, he’s given a little bag with garlic, a bit of lime, salt and tobacco in it, to hang round his neck. Tobacco is important because it is a sacred plant for Indians. This all means that the child can ward off all the evil things in life. For us, bad things are like spirits, which exist only in our imagination. Something bad, for instance, would be if the child were to turn out to be a gossip–not sincere, truthful and respectful, as a child should be. It also helps him collect together and preserve all our ancestors’ things. That’s more or less the idea of the bag–to keep him pure. The bag is put inside the four candles as well, and this represents the promise of the child when he grows up.

When the child is forty days old, there are more speeches, more promises on his behalf, and he becomes a full member of the community. This is his baptism. All the important people of the village are invited and they speak. The parents make a commitment. They promise to teach the child to keep the secrets of our people, so that our culture and customs will be preserved. The village leaders come and offer their experience, their example, and their knowledge of our ancestors. They explain how to preserve our traditions. Then, they promise to be responsible for the child, teach him as he grows up, and see that he follows in their ways. It’s also something of a criticism of humanity, and of the many people who have forsaken their traditions. They say almost a prayer, asking that our traditions again enter the spirits of those who have forsaken them. Then, they evoke the names of our ancestors, like Tecun Umán and others who form part of the ceremony, as a kind of chant. They must be remembered as heroes of the Indian peoples. And then they say (I analyse all this later): ‘Let no landowner extinguish all this, nor any rich man wipe out our customs. Let our children, be they workers or servants, respect and keep their secrets.’ The child is present for all of this, although he’s all wrapped up and can scarcely be seen. He is told that he will eat maize and that, naturally, he is already made of maize because his mother ate it while he was forming in her stomach. He must respect the maize; even the grain of maize which has been thrown away, he must pick up. The child will multiply our race, he will replace all those who have died. From this moment, he takes on this responsibility, and is told to live as his ‘grandparents’ have lived. The parents then reply that their child promises to accomplish all this. So, the village leaders and the parents all make promises on behalf of the child. It’s his initiation into the community.

The ceremony is very important. It is also when the child is considered a child of God, our one father. We don’t actually have the word God but that is what it is, because the one father is the only one we have. To reach this one father, the child must love beans, maize, the earth. The one father is the heart of the sky; that is, the sun. The sun is the father and our mother is the moon. She is a gentle mother. And she lights our way. Our people have many notions about the moon, and about the sun. They are the pillars of the universe.

When children reach ten years old, that’s the moment when their parents and the village leaders talk to them again. They tell them that they will be young men and women and that one day they will be fathers and mothers. This is actually when they tell the child that he must never abuse his dignity, in the same way his ancestors never abused their dignity. It’s also when they remind them that our ancestors were dishonoured by the white man, by colonization. But they don’t tell them the way that it’s written down in books, because the majority of Indians can’t read or write, and don’t even know that they have their own texts. No, they learn it through oral recommendations, the way it has been handed down through the generations. They are told that the Spaniards dishonoured our ancestors’ finest sons, and the most humble of them. And it is to honour these humble people that we must keep our secrets. And no-one except we Indians must know. They talk a lot about our ancestors. And the ten-years ceremony is also when our children are reminded that they must respect their elders, even though this is something their parents have been telling them ever since they were little. For example, if an old person is walking along the street, children should cross over to allow him to pass by. If any of us sees an elderly person, we are obliged to bow and greet them. Everyone does this, even the very youngest. We also show respect to pregnant women. Whenever we make food, we always keep some for any of our neighbours who are pregnant.

When little girls are born, the midwives pierce their ears at the same time as they tie their umbilical cords. The little bags round their necks and the thread used to tie their umbilical cord are both red. Red is very significant for us. It means heat, strength, all living things. It’s linked to the sun, which for us is the channel to the one God, the heart of everything, of the universe. So red gives off heat and fire and red things are supposed to give life to the child. At the same time, it asks him to respect living things too. There are no special clothes for the baby. We don’t buy anything special beforehand but just use pieces of corte to wrap him in.

When a male child is born, there are special celebrations, not because he’s male but because of all the hard work and responsibility he’ll have as a man. It’s not that machismo doesn’t exist among our people, but it doesn’t present a problem for the community because it’s so much part of our way of life. The male child is given an extra day alone with his mother. The usual custom is to celebrate a male child by killing a sheep or some chickens. Boys are given more, they get more food because their work is harder and they have more responsibility. At the same time, he is head of the household, not in the bad sense of the word, but because he is responsible for so many things. This doesn’t mean girls aren’t valued. Their work is hard too and there are other things that are due to them as mothers. Girls are valued because they are part of the earth, which gives us maize, beans, plants and everything we live on. The earth is like a mother which multiplies life. So the girl child will multiply the life of our generation and of our ancestors whom we must respect. The girl and the boy are both integrated into the community in equally important ways, the two are inter-related and compatible. Nevertheless, the community is always happier when a male child is born and the men feel much prouder. The customs, like the tying of the hands and feet, apply to both boys and girls.

Babies are breastfed. It’s much better than any other sort of food. But the important thing is the sense of community. It’s something we all share. From the very first day, the baby belongs to the community, not only to the parents, and the baby must learn from all of us…in fact, we behave just like bourgeois families in that, as soon as the baby is born, we’re thinking of his education, of his well-being. But our people feel that the baby’s school must be the community itself, that he must learn to live like all the rest of us. The tying of the hands at birth also symbolizes this; that no-one should accumulate things the rest of the community does not have and he must know how to share, to have open hands. The mother must teach the baby to be generous. This way of thinking comes from poverty and suffering. Each child is taught to live like the fellow members of his community.

We never eat in front of pregnant women. You can only eat in front of a pregnant woman if you can offer something as well. The fear is that, otherwise, she might abort the baby or that the baby could suffer if she didn’t have enough to eat. It doesn’t matter whether you know her or not. The important thing is sharing. You have to treat a pregnant woman differently from other women because she is two people. You must treat her with respect so that she recognizes it and conveys this to the baby inside her. You instinctively think she’s the image of the baby about to be born. So you love her. Another reason why you must stop and talk to a pregnant woman is because she doesn’t have much chance to rest or enjoy herself. She’s always worried and depressed. So when she stops and chats a bit, she can relax and feel some relief.

When the baby joins the community, with him in the circle of candles–together with his little red bag–he will have his hoe, his machete, his axe and all the tools he will need in life. These will be his playthings. A little girl will have her washing board and all the things she will need when she grows up. She must learn the things of the house; to clean, to wash and sew her brothers’ trousers, for example. The little boy must begin to live like a man, to be responsible and learn to love the work in the fields. The learning is done as a kind of game. When the parents do anything they always explain what it means. This includes learning prayers. This is very important to our people. The mother may say a prayer at any time. Before getting up in the morning, for instance, she thanks the day which is dawning because it might be a very important one for the family. Before lighting the fire, she blesses the wood because that fire is going to cook food for the whole family. Since it’s the little girl who is closest to her mother, she learns all of this. Before washing the nixtamal, the woman blows on her hands and puts them in the nixtamal. She takes everything out and washes it well. She blows on her hands so that her work will bear fruit. She does it before she does the wash as well. She explains all these little details to her daughter, who learns by copying her. With the men it’s the same. Before they start work every day, whatever hour of the morning it is, they greet the sun. They remove their hats and talk to the sun before starting work. Their sons learn to do it too, taking off their little hats to talk to the sun. Naturally, each ethnic group has its own forms of expression. Other groups have different customs from ours. The meaning of their weaving patterns, for example. We realize the others are different in some things, but the one thing we have in common is our culture. Our people are mainly peasants, but there are some people who buy and sell as well. They go into this after they’ve worked on the land. Sometimes when they come back from working in the finca, instead of tending a little plot of land, they’ll start a shop and look for a different sort of life. But if they’re used to greeting the sun every morning, they still go on doing it. And they keep all their old customs. Every part of our culture comes from the earth. Our religion comes from the maize and bean harvests which are so vital to our community. So even if a man goes to try and make some money, he never forgets his culture springs from the earth.

As we grow up we have a series of obligations. Our parents teach us to be responsible; just as they have been responsible. The eldest son is responsible for the house. Whatever the father cannot correct is up to the eldest son to correct. He is like a second father to us all and is responsible for our upbringing. The mother is the one who is responsible for keeping an account of what the family eats, and what she has to buy. When a child is ill, she has to get medicine. But the father has to solve a lot of problems too. And each one of us, as we grow up, has our own small area of responsibility. This comes from the promises made for the child when he is born, and from the continuity of our customs. The child can make the promise for himself when his parents have taught him to do it. The mother, who is closest to the children, does this, or sometimes the father. They talk to their children, explaining what they have to do and what our ancestors used to do. They don’t impose it as a law, but just give the example of what our ancestors have always done. This is how we all learn our own small responsibilities. For example, the little girl begins by carrying water, and the little boy begins by tying up the dogs when the animals are brought into the yard at night, or by fetching a horse which has wandered off. Both girls and boys have their tasks and are told the reasons for doing them. They learn responsibility because if they don’t do their little jobs, well, their father has the right to scold them, or even beat them. So, they are very careful about learning to do their jobs well, but the parents are also very careful to explain exactly why the jobs have to be done. The little girl understands the reasons for everything her mother does. For example, when she puts a new earthenware pot on the fire for the first time, she hits it five times with a branch, so that it knows its job is to cook and so that it lasts. When the little girl asks, ‘Why did you do that?’, her mother says, ‘So that it knows what its job is and does it well.’ When it’s her turn to cook, the little girl does as her mother does. Again this is all bound up with our commitment to maintain our customs and pass on the secrets of our ancestors. The elected fathers of the community explain to us that all these things come down to us from our grandfathers and we must conserve them. Nearly everything we do today is based on what our ancestors did. This is the main purpose of our elected leader–to embody all the values handed down from our ancestors. He is the leader of the community, a father to all our children, and he must lead an exemplary life. Above all, he has a commitment to the whole community. Everything that is done today, is done in memory of those who have passed on.