Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat:
This workshop was a huge gift. Magical. I met incredible women and the experience of sharing each others’ stories was spectacular and encouraging. –Bridget Price, Mexico City
The program was well-organized. It was hard to make choices about what to attend. I didn’t want to give anything up. The material was amazing. There was a sense of community beyond anything I ever expected. — Katie Kingston, Colorado
Beth and Robin are great teachers. They made everything flow. – Nancy Coleman, Maine
This was a great experience and opportunity. It helped me to express myself. I loved this workshop. – Janet Chavez Santiago, Oaxaca
Immersion in a new culture with a group of talented and inspiring women was definitely the catalyst for this poem, “Woman Resting.” One day I found myself resting in the hammock, and while letting its hypnotic sway take over, I experienced the flooding of the five senses in this magical place, Teotitlán del Valle. I was motivated to write this poem, to try in one small way to capture the experience of this slower paced lifestyle. I haven’t experienced such a “lull” since childhood.
Teotitlán del Valle is all about weaving; indigo and cochineal dye hangs in natural wool skeins from the roof top lines. It fact, it seems that everything hangs from the sky in Teotitlan: the drying threads, the hammocks, the pomegranates, the grapefruits, the laundry, and even the sounds: birds, burros, roosters, pigs. The experience at the Oaxaca Woman’s Writing Retreat was enhanced by the meditative atmosphere that allows for interpretation with a gathering of women who believe in writing as a spiritual plunge into the unknown.
When I returned to the United States, I submitted the poem to Nimrod International Journal’s 2011 Pablo Neruda Prize for Poetry, www.nimrod@utulsa.edu, where it placed as a finalist and was published in the Nimrod Award Issue titled, “What Time Is It?” Other good news followed. I submitted my manuscript, What Does Lorca Own?, which had been reviewed at the conference by Robin Greene. We discussed the manuscript in depth, and I sent out the revision to several competitions. It placed as a finalist in the 2011 Idaho Prize for Poetry, www.losthorsepress.org, and will be published in October 2012 by Lost Horse Press (distributed by the University of Washington Press, Seattle) under the new title Translating Clouds.
No writer ever writes alone, and I have many individuals to thank for their support including Norma Hawthorne, Robin Greene, Susan Florence, and the other talented participants of the 2011 Oaxaca Women’s Writing Retreat. For me, the experience was a success, giving me the time to write new poems, forge new friendships, and experience a new culture, where I felt welcome and safe as I hiked the village roads and spoke to goat herders, children learning English, and women who smiled back.
kingston@wildblue.net, www.katiekingston.com
Day of the Dead Photography Expedition:
This was truly a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and every aspect of this program exceeded my expectations. Norma and Bill, you were incredible guides to culture, photography, and more! I loved the vigil experience at the cemeteries in Xoxocotlan, and could have stayed until dawn – it was for this particular opportunity that I enrolled in this Day of the Dead expedition, and yet this was only one of the impressive components. In addition we learned first-hand about cooking, preparation of home altars, weaving, markets, village life, and of course, photography. The diversity of our group members’ experiences and contributions further enriched the program. In a nutshell, the expedition was absolutely well organized, with great technical teaching by Bill and a wonderful, culturally-sensitive leader in Norma. I highly recommend it to others.
– Jenny Snead Williams, Executive Director, Duke University Center for Latino/a Studies, Durham, NC
