International Women’s Day was Thursday, March 8, 2018. It’s days later and I now find time to acknowledge, honor, recognize, applaud some of the women we met along the way during our two back-to-back Chiapas Textile Study Tours in February and March this year.
Women make, sell, suckle babies in Magdalenas Aldama, Chiapas
I don’t know all their names.
The Virgin of Guadalupe is a Zapatista icon in Chiapas, role model for justice
Their hands, feet and faces are universal stories of women who work hard with little recompense.
Shop keeper, San Juan Chamula, Chiapas
Their garments tell the stories of culture, history, creativity and subjugation by Spanish conquerors who imposed clothing style as indigenous identifier.
Maria and her niece, Aguacatenango, Chiapas
Most are women who weave or embroider.
Maruch is her Tzotzil name, Maria is her Christian name, San Juan Chamula district
Some are women who craft pottery — cooking vessels and decorative jaguars, many of them life-size.
This is Esperanza sculpting a clay jaguar, Amantenango del Valle, Chiapas
A few are famous. Most are not.
Grand Master of Mexican Folk Art Juana Gomez Ramirez, Amantenango del Valle
They are mothers, daughters, grandmothers, aunts, cousins, nieces.
Rosa, center, and her nieces, Magdalenas Aldama
Some, like Rosa and her husband Cristobal, participated in the 1994 Zapatista uprising to stand for indigenous rights. The movement paved the way for a stronger voice for women.
Producing handmade paper, Los Leñateros, San Cristobal de Las Casas
They carry babies on their backs, harnessed by robozos.
Market day, San Juan Chamula, Chiapas
They use rebozos shifted to the front of their bodies so infants can suckle. They use rebozos to carry market vegetables and fruit to the cooking fires.
Lourdes, research coordinator, Museo Textil Mundo Maya
Few are professionals like Lourdes who translates Spanish to English for us, educated in sophisticated cities far away.
Maria Meza, weaving cooperative director, Tenejapa, Chiapas
Others head cooperatives, organizing the business of textile making and selling to sustain families.
A metaphor for indigenous women worldwide, essential and faceless
Some are faceless. We see their progeny.
Manuela Trevini Bellini with PomPom Shawl at her shop Punto Y Trama,
A few are expats from Italy, France, Canada, the United States or Japan, who migrate to the promise land.
Women’s hands make organic tortillas from native corn
We see hands making tortillas, tending the cooking fire, soothing a child’s cry, serving a husband dinner.
Pioneer Swiss photographer, Gertrude Duby Blom, at Na Bolom
Most of all, we know that women’s work begins early and ends late, is continuous, often self-less and usually in the service of others.
Andrea Diaz Hernandez weaves this for eight months, San Andres Larrainzar
Take a moment to consider what women around the world give as we regard those whose photos we see here.
In Yochib, Oxchuc, impaired mobility, health care access hours away
Take a moment to give thanks to all the women in the world. We are more similar than we are different.
Meet the Women of Chiapas: 2019 Textile Study Tour
What will become of the next generation of women?
Omar’s Discovery Tour: A First Visit to the USA
Omar Chavez Santiago is twenty-four years old. He is a weaver and natural dyer from Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca, Mexico. Last year, he graduated with a degree in industrial engineering after studying for four years at Anahuac University in Oaxaca. He is at a cross-roads.
Fayetteville, Lillington, Coats, NC friends give Omar a warm welcome in Durham. Thanks Becky, Robin and Debbie for your support.
Does he pursue a professional engineering career and move to Monterrey or continue in the generations-old family tradition of his Zapotec culture?
On March 1, 2017, Omar went to Mexico City for an interview appointment at the US Embassy to follow-up on his visitor visa application to enter the USA. He is male. He is young. We didn’t know what his chances would be. Slim, I thought. Very slim. So few are allowed to enter.
I wrote my Congressman G.K. Butterfield ((D-NC) to ask if they would send a message and alert the Embassy staff that Omar would be there on March 1 to present a letter of invitation from me and Wendy Sease, owner of INDIO Durham. We invited him to give a presentation and sale of the family’s 100% naturally dyed wool rugs in early April.
List to this GistYarn Podcast with Omar Chavez Santiago
Omar, age 24, has been weaving since he was eight years old.
An alert is different from a request to approve. No one interferes with US Embassy immigration decisions. An alert just says, Look out for this applicant. I guess they did. At the end of the short interview, Omar was awarded a 10-year visa. Ojala.
Discovering La Superior Carneceria y Super Tienda, Durham
Three weeks later, the paperwork arrived in Teotitlan del Valle, and Omar arrived in Durham, North Carolina on March 28.
I started calling this Omar’s Discovery Tour because everything was new to him. Exciting. Inspiring. Being here gave him the chance to see that what Galeria Fe y Lola creates in Oaxaca is linked to the home goods fashion cycle in the USA, where most of their clients come from. It connected the dots.
A walk through Duke University with Jacob and Hettie.
He discovered that design and color preferences change according to season. Texture and palette compliment. He saw traditional and contemporary side-by-side. He saw cities and farmland. Innovation and comfort. The edges where his countrymen and women live beyond the chi-chi neighborhoods, shopping in grocery stores named La Superior Carneceria or Compare or Tienda Mexicana Guadalupana, where life is familiar and safe. He heard an earful about politics, leadership void and political discontent.
A walk through Duke Gardens with Jacob
Omar thinks we are organized, tidy, friendly, and open to opportunity. (Of course, we know this is NOT a universal truth in the USA.)
Lime bikes propagate in downtown Durham. Take a ride.
He likes that people here greet him with a smile, that cars stop for pedestrians, and he can ride a Lime Bike on the American Tobacco Trail all afternoon for a few dollars, followed by beer and bonding at Ponysaurus with Jacob and Kathryn. He likes that we recycle (some of us). And, he can put on his jogging shoes and run for miles on groomed paths and streets.
Wow, there are REALLY good goat tacos here, just like in Mexico
It got to the point after the first week that he could rank order the best hamburgers in Durham after tastings at many restaurants. In retail shops, he was invited to sit down in a comfy chair or sofa, offered refreshment, and an invitation to kibbitz informally. He saw that deep friendships can be formed well beyond the inner circle of family.
A talk and cochineal dye demo at Echoview Fiber Mill, Weaverville, NC
Then, we went to Asheville and Weaverville, where the fiber arts community welcomed Omar for a cochineal dye demonstration and exhibition. We ate at Buxton Hall Barbecue and White Duck Tacos, and walked the downtown going in and out of fine art and craft galleries. He was mesmerized by the creativity. We slept in a cozy Arts & Crafts Cottage on the Blue Ridge Parkway hosted by Laura and Bryan.
100% naturally dyed churro wool rugs from Galeria Fe y Lola
Omar began to imagine that his dreams could become a reality. He began building new dreams. By the time he went home on Saturday morning after almost three weeks here, he was excited and inspired to create new designs, incorporate new business ideas, capture on cloth that which captured his imagination, and incorporate elements of traditional Zapotec motifs with new energy.
I wish we could give this opportunity to other talented young Mexicans who have dreams, who want to create and add value to their country.
Making the presentation at Echoview Fiber Mill, in collaboration with Local Cloth
Cochineal dye demonstration at Echoview Fiber Mill
I feel much this way when I go to Mexico. I see that families are tightly knit, where ancient ritual gives meaning to life, how reverence for the elderly shapes continuity, how people take time to be with families and celebrate together.
Art at the Durham Museum Hotel
Travel broadens and opens us up to more than new experiences. It gives us something intangible, a new neural pathway to exploration, learning, becoming. It gives us an opportunity to befriend, to connect and to live expansively with meaning.
Taking a break at Ponysaurus Brewing Company, Durham
It was twelve-and-a-half years ago when I met Omar’s brother Eric and sister Janet in the Teotitlan del Valle rug market. They were both students, not knowing where their paths would lead. Omar was not quite twelve. Through mutual support and effort, our lives were changed.
Thanks to all who supported Omar with a purchase!
Laura and her family with Omar in Asheville
There are many people to thank for making Omar’s Discovery Tour possible: parents Federico Chavez Sosa and Dolores Santiago Arrellenas in Teotitlan del Valle; Wendy Sease, Hettie Johnson, Jacob Singleton, Kathryn Salisbury, Karen Soskin, Steve Haskin, Nick and Rochelle Johnson in Durham; Laura and Bryan Tompkins, Judi Jetson with Local Cloth, Grace Casey-Gouin at Echoview Fiber Mill in Asheville and Weaverville, and our friends everywhere. Thank you.
We are talking now about when he may return.
→ 18 Comments
Posted in Cultural Commentary, Teotitlan del Valle, Textiles, Tapestries & Weaving
Tagged Asheville, cloth, Durham, Echoview Fiber Mill, fiber, fiber art, Galeria Fe y Lola, INDIO Durham, Mexico, natural dyes, North Carolina, Oaxaca, rugs, textiles, weaving, wool, workshop