The guests of honour congratulate the couple and exhort them to be good parents. They hope they’ll have good children, that they’ll bear life with fortitude and live as human beings, and won’t abuse the natural world. Then the couple is given the floor. When they have finished speaking, there’s a discussion about all the things that happen in the country. They talk about cars, about the ladinos’ bathrooms, and about the rich. They do it to shake themselves free of it. They say that the bathrooms of the rich shine like new dresses whereas we, the poor, have nothing but a hole to go to. And our cooking pots are different from theirs too. But they also insist that we don’t desire what the rich have. We have hands to make our pottery with and we don’t want to lose the skill. They say: ‘These things may be modern but we mustn’t buy the rubbish they have, even if we have the money. We must keep our ways of making our own.’ Our village does not have a grinder for our maize. This is not because we could not get one. Many landowners would gladly install one to grind the maize for the whole village. But our people say no. The ladinos bring their machines in little by little and very soon they own everything.
Between the third and fourth ceremonies, there is a separate little fiesta just for the family. It’s when the father tells his daughter that his responsibility towards her is over. From now on her life will be different, although she must still live within a community the way all Indians should, and keep in close communion with nature. Her mother buys something or has something woven for her daughter as a surprise, and she’s shown all the presents she will be taking with her, although she won’t be given them until the fourth ceremony when the husband-to-be’s parents are present. These days this small fiesta is held any day, whenever there’s time. But my grandfather says that before they always had it on a special day–forty days before the girl left home. We didn’t do that for my sister because there wasn’t time. At the family fiesta, the girl’s brothers and sisters all speak, the younger ones as well as the older ones. The little ones say things like: ‘Thank you for all you’ve done for us, for looking after us, for carrying us around, and for changing our nappies.’ We look on a sister rather like a mother, because she’s part of what our mother has done for us. So they thank their sister for all her work, and for the difficult experiences of their parents. They tell her whatever nice feeling they want to express. The older ones tell her to remain pure and wholesome because they looked after her since she was small. They also promise to gather the flowers to arrange for her farewell fiesta. One of them says: ‘I promise on behalf of all your brothers and sisters to arrange the flowers.’ The bride-to-be then thanks them for all they have done for her. She also kneels before her parents and thanks them too. They know it will be very painful and sad for her to leave the community she has known for so long and they give her a lot of good family advice. They tell her never to forget them. There’s no special time for this fiesta to finish. They can go on talking as long as they like. The parents tell the girl what most of the presents she’ll be getting when she leaves are–hens, a dog, a sheep, cooking pots. Her mother has been making the earthenware cooking pots Indians use for her. We never buy anything like that from the market. Mothers always make them. Her mother also makes some small mats for her. Indians think it is dreadful to sit on chairs, women especially, because the woman is the mother of the home and the earth is the mother of the whole world–the mother of all our indigenous people. The importance of the mother is related to the importance of the earth. So we usually sit on the ground, on the mats our women weave. The girl takes with her half a dozen small and some large mats, and some little presents from her mother, but the rest she will receive at her farewell fiesta. As a symbol of all the happiness and sadness the parents and brothers and sisters feel for their sister, we always, always, burn some incense. We always burn incense, our sacred smoke, in all our ceremonies. It’s as if we are making a sacrifice to our one Lord. The family burns incense for the young girl because she’s bound to be very sad at leaving her family, her work and everything. She’ll have to do the other family’s work now, but it will be the same sort of work because most communities have the same customs. My sister’s problem was that she went to live in another community with a different language and different customs.
The fourth and last ritual is the despedida, the farewell ceremony, when the young girl is given her presents and says goodbye to the community. This is the saddest part. Both sets of parents must be present. There are two locations because there are two forms of marriage now. There is our traditional ceremony according to our customs. Then there’s the civil ceremony or the Catholic church ceremony. Some people go to the civil registry or the church, then back to the girl’s house for the traditional despedida, and then the girl leaves from there for the young man’s home. But others have the despedida first, then go to the registry or the church, and the girl is delivered to the boy’s home after that.
The actual despedida is like this. First, the house is decorated by the brothers and sisters who promised to collect flowers and arrange them. Indians think of flowers as part of nature and you never see flowers in an Indian house. There are some flowers, though, like this white flower, the cartucho, which you get more in cold countries and we sow that, not in the house but in our neighbours’ fields or in a corner away from the house. We pick them on special occasions, like a fiesta or an important ceremony. My father explained that we don’t need flowers in the house any other time because we live amongst plants and trees, which are all part of nature. The brothers and sisters have to pick them and decorate the house. Some of the cost of the despedida is born by the parents but the community provides most of the things. All the neighbours know when the young girl is going away, and they all come around and bring things (just like when a baby is born). They bring wood, dough, meat, and the parents only have to provide the guaro. We make two types of guaro. One is a strong alcohol like rum or tequila, and the other is a sort of smooth, rather sweet, wine. So the parents make the drink and the neighbours bring everything else. They all arrive and act as if they were in their own homes. They take out the pots and utensils, make the food, and prepare the house. The community does everything. The same happens when the girl is received into the young man’s home–it is the community that receives her. The girl is there ready with all her new things (except for the ones she’ll be given when her young man is there), and all the things that belonged to her before. The neighbours all bring her little presents too, a cooking pot or a sobainita. One of the neighbours is chosen on behalf of the community to present the young girl with all the little things they have brought. If the guests are expected at ten in the morning, the neighbours will be there from five o’clock onwards preparing the house and the food. At ten everything is ready. The neighbours have another important way of showing their affection. All the wood the girl will be given has to be cut on the very day of the despedida, so the men are out from five in the morning cutting the wood and chopping it up ready for the party.
It is a big party. First, they receive the parents of the young girl and all the neighbours eat together. Then the parents of the young man arrive accompanied by another couple, all the uncles and aunts, the elder brothers and sisters, the grandparents and the village representatives. The girl meets the young man’s godparents for the first time and her father introduces her godparents to him. Godparents are chosen when a child is born and they must be present at this ceremony. After the first greeting, the mother brings out all the presents for the girl and says: ‘This is all we can give you, may it give you encouragement.’ The parents-in-law accept the girl’s things. Then the grandmother begins talking about everything that is happening at that time. She gives the girl a large bunch of flowers prepared for her by her own grandchildren. As she offers the bunch she explains that this flower is sacred, pure and that the young girl must live as all our women live. She must be a mother. She explains about all the things that happen to our women–about prostitution, about working as maids i
n the towns, the women who work on the coast. She tells her of the bad examples to avoid and gives her advice for her to think about. She tells her she mustn’t have more than one husband because our ancestors disapproved of that vanity. She talks about this important thing like this: ‘My children, these days to get married you have to sign a silly piece of paper. They say there is a mayor, files, and papers even for our people. We didn’t have any of this before. We got married the way our customs, our ceremonies laid down for us. We didn’t have to sign any bits of paper. Under our ancestors’ laws, men and women didn’t separate, but if a woman was suffering, she could leave her husband. Now, she can’t leave her husband because she’s signed a paper. The Church’s laws and the ladinos’ laws are the same in this–you cannot separate. But the Indian feels responsible for every member of his community, and it’s hard for him to accept that, if a woman is suffering, the community can do nothing for her because the law says she cannot leave her husband.’ The grandmother tries to give her granddaughter a general idea of what she feels about what is happening in the world, in Guatemala. She finishes with her voice full of feeling. It hurts her very much to see many of the things that happen. She would never want any granddaughter of hers to be a prostitute. It is the grandfather who talks to the young man. He goes through certain customs in his house with his own family. This is the real despedida when the grandmother offers these flowers.
The fiesta goes on with other people, especially the women, talking to the girl. They ask her not to forget all her memories of the community. She must make sure she is respected as a woman, as our ancestors would wish. She must have the courage to face our hard life but be tender as a mother and teach her children to respect nature. We don’t kiss each other on the cheek. One way of showing respect is to kneel and kiss our parents’ hands. The girl kneels to everyone present and kisses the hands of her parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles and elder brother. Then she kneels and kisses the hands of all the young man’s family. They take her hand and tell her to get up. The young man does the same with his family and with the girl’s family. This is the promise sworn. This is the marriage.
The parents of the girl then say, ‘In fifteen days we want to see our daughter again here.’ When the girl goes out of the door of her house, she may not look back, and can’t go back to that house until fifteen days have passed. The explanation my parents gave was that my sister was now a grown-up person and that she must not look back when she’s faced with all the problems she will meet. She must always go forward. Her nest, the house where she was born, will no longer be her house. She will never be a child again.
It has now been decided where the girl will live, whether she’ll have a hut of her own or if she’ll live with the boy’s parents. In our community, we are all used to living as brothers and sisters, so a girl will be sad if she is going to live alone. These days, we don’t have time for many of the customs our ancestors honoured, but if there is time, the girl’s parents or grandparents will go with her. There wasn’t really any time when my sister was married but since my father was the elected leader of our village, he was able to send my sister’s godparents and my elder brother with her to her new home. The whole community was waiting to receive her in the young man’s house. They had a bunch of flowers too. There she is given her grinding stone and her cooking pot. She must always keep her pot for washing the nixtamal, her kitchen utensils and the maize. They also give her her big mat and her smaller mats and show her where her place in the house will be. Most houses don’t have separate rooms for each couple. But first they cut a little bit from each of the four corners of the house for her. The houses are made from palm leaves or cane so they can cut a bit off. In each of the corners they light the young man’s candle. They burn some incense and the bits from the four corners to welcome the young bride. This is how they ask the house’s permission to allow another person to live there.
There may come a time when the couple don’t get on together and do not have a happy life. Then there are problems. But it is important that we all try to solve these matrimonial problems by explaining to the couple that they must make their life together and that it will be a different life. The elected leaders will come and try and talk to them as if they were their own children, and it is the responsibility of both sets of godparents to help the couple. If the problem can’t be solved, however, the girl is protected by her parents. She can go back to them as long as she hasn’t broken with any of their traditions. There have been cases where the girl gets tired of waiting for the different rituals to take place and her young man takes her away. But then they run the risk of her father refusing to have her back if the marriage doesn’t work. The young man’s parents also reject him because he did not obey the laws–what our forefathers taught us. In the past, there was no law to bind a couple forever, as the Church and the State have now. There were laws which had to be obeyed but there was nothing which tied people together forever. The community gives as much support as they can to the young girl who goes away. The whole village is present when she leaves and expresses its feelings. They say: ‘Whatever happens, we are always here. You must lead your own life but if things go wrong, we will help you.’ All Indian women have this–the support of their community–as long as they don’t break our laws. If a girl does break them, the community does have a heart, but it will look at her with different eyes. It all depends on the girl. Among our people, there are men who come home drunk and beat their wives. But a wife who is very fond of her husband, and thinks of him as the father of her children, doesn’t complain as much as her community allows her to.
In my sister’s marriage, things went rather wrong. She couldn’t get used to the new community, because of the different language and customs of her husband’s parents and her husband himself. We live very much within a community, so how could she be happy there if she didn’t understand them? So my parents discussed the problem with the husband’s parents and the village leader. My father said: ‘Our community is willing to help you as a family. I think my daughter should come back and live near here so we can help you better.’ They agreed my sister should come back to our village. She didn’t come back to our house, of course. The whole village helped and two weeks later she was fixing up her own little house. She couldn’t come back to our house because we have a very large family and my cousins were living with us then. My sister had a little boy and my father said they should lead their own life. The community gave them part of our collective land, and a few beans and maize so that they could work and live. A woman has no problem, whether she works on her own or collectively, whether she’s married or single, as long as she obeys the laws of the community. If anything goes wrong, her neighbours will always help her and she can count on the community. This is exactly what our parents tell us on our tenth birthday.
XII
LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY
‘Don’t you understand that the game is a sign of freedom, of death, and of fate, which governs the sentences of the judges. The only ones daring enough to play are dead.’
—Popol Vuh
‘I’m a catechist who walks upon this earth, not one who thinks only of the kingdom of God.’
—Rigoberta Menchú
I remember things very, very well from the time I was twelve. It’s then that I thought like a responsible woman. When we do collective work, to have something extra in case someone in the community dies, or is ill, only the adults work. Of course, we have this relationship with our community from the very beginning but, even so, it becomes much stronger when we start having a real obligation to the community. Each member of the family always has a duty to perform. Like visiting neighbours, for instance, spending time talking to them in any free moments. Not quarrelling with neighbours since that sometimes causes bad feeling. And children don’t have petty rows like grown-ups. They start fighting with other children, with their neighbours.
Well, at twelve, I joined in the communal work; things like harvesting t
he maize. I worked together with the others. It was also then that I began making friends, closer friends, in the community. I began taking over my mother’s role too. My mother was the woman who coordinated certain things in the community. For instance: ‘What shall we sow prior to the maize?’ ‘Should we only sow beans?’ ‘How shall we do it?’ Most of this is our work–sowing beans, sowing potatoes, or any kind of vegetables which can be grown on the same land as the maize. Putting in little sticks for the beans so they don’t harm the maize, or tying up the tendrils of the chilacayotes or whatever vegetables we’ve sown in with the maize. We define a task: what we have to do, step by step. Every compañero, every neighbour, has his little bit to tend, to harvest, to pick the crop. He tends it from the first day it is sown, looking after the plant right through until it bears fruit and he picks the fruit. We all make a promise to do this. It’s a collective obligation, naturally.
It was during that time that I began to take on responsibility. The Catholic religion had already come to our region. The Catholic religion chooses, or at least the priests choose, people to become catechists. I was a catechist from the age of twelve. The priest used to come to our area every three months. He’d bring texts for us to teach the doctrine to our community. We did it on our own initiative as well, because my father was a dedicated Christian. By accepting the Catholic religion, we didn’t accept a condition, or abandon our culture. It was more like another way of expressing ourselves. If everyone believes in this medium, it’s just another medium of expression. It’s like expressing ourselves through a tree, for example; we believe that a tree is a being, a part of nature, and that a tree has its image, its representation, its nahual, to channel our feelings to the one God. That is the way we Indians conceive it. Catholic Action is like another element which can merge with the elements which already exist within Indian culture. And it confirms our belief that, yes, there is a God, and, yes, there is a father for all of us. And yet it is something we think of as being only for what happens up there. As far as the earth is concerned, we must go on worshipping through our own intermediaries, just as we always have done, through all the elements found in nature. And this helped us a lot in becoming catechists and taking on the responsibility of teaching others; in the way we teach in our community, by being an example to others who are growing up. Many of the images of Catholic Action are similar to ours, although ours are not written down. A lot of it is familiar. For example, we believe we have ancestors, and that these ancestors are important because they’re good people who obeyed the laws of our people. The Bible talks about forefathers too. So it is not something unfamiliar to us. We accept these biblical forefathers as if they were our own ancestors, while still keeping within our own culture and our own customs. At the same time, it often refers to leaders, to kings. For instance the Bible tells us that there were kings who beat Christ. We drew a parallel with our king, Tecún Umán, who was defeated and persecuted by the Spaniards, and we take that as our own reality. In this way we adjusted to the Catholic religion and our duties as Christians, and made it part of our culture. As I said, it’s just another way of expressing ourselves. It’s not the only, immutable way of keeping our ancestors’ intermediaries alive. It’s twice the work for us, because we have to learn the doctrine, and we have to learn to pray. We pray in our ceremonies in our own culture, so that’s not so different. We just have to memorize the prayers they tell us to use and add them to our own. Everything has to be in our language. Well, sometimes it’s something we do, not because we understand it, but because that’s the way it has to be. Because I remember that at first the prayers weren’t even in Spanish but in Latin or something like that. So although it’s something we say and express with all our faith, we don’t always understand what it means. Since the priests don’t know our language and they say the prayers in Spanish, our job is to memorize the prayers, and the chants. But we didn’t understand exactly what it meant, it was just a channel for our self-expression. It’s very important for us, but we don’t understand it.
I, Rigoberta Menchu Page 11