Listen to the voices of Afro-Colombian trans women who speak about their powerful connections to the Pacific rivers

Las Jaibas produced an audiovisual project unique in Colombia

Originally published on Global Voices

Yo soy Ana Yudith Gamboa,

la que nació en el río Anchicayá. 

Y allá quedó su ombligo enterrado 

en un árbol de guayabo.

I am Ana Yudith Gamboa,

who was born in the Anchicayá river.

And there her umbilical cord was buried

in a guava tree.

This is how Ana Yudith Gamboa introduces herself in “Oshúm and the Tones of Water,” a podcast and audiovisual project by Las Jaibas, a collective from Cali, Colombia. With that handful of verses, Gamboa says almost everything. This project is not just about a land, but more about a river that originates in Cali, runs through the rainiest humid forests on the planet and flows into the Pacific. “La mayora,” as the women who lead Black communities and safeguard their traditions are called, talks about the navel ritual in the Anchicayá river basin, in the first episode of the series:

Esa es una tradición que teníamos anteriormente. Cuando la mujer paría, se sacaba la placenta, el cordón umbilical y se enterraba. ¿Con qué se cortaba anteriormente? Se hacía un bisturí de guadua que quedaba bien afiladito y con eso, ¡zaz!, se cortaba el ombligo. Y ese ombligo y esa placenta iban a dar allá, a la tierra, en un árbol de guayaba porque es flexible, es muy medicinal. Mientras enterraban mi ombligo estaban tostando la corteza del guayabo, bien, bien tostadita, ¡prrun!, la metieron en mi ombligo. Y luego, de ahí, —es muy misterioso nuestro ombligo— lo amarraban y ponían a calentar un machete y, cuando estaba bien rojito, cogían y, ¡ñuiiiis!, lo ponían en el pedacito de ombligo para cauterizarlo.

That is a tradition that we had in the past. When a woman gave birth, the placenta and the umbilical cord were removed and buried. What was it cut with before? A scalpel was made out of guadua [bamboo] that was very sharp and with that, zap!, the umbilical cord was cut. And that umbilical cord and that placenta ended up there, in the ground, in a guava tree because it is flexible, it is medicinal. While they were burying my umbilical cord, they were toasting the guava bark, very, very toasted and, prrun!, they put it in my navel. And then — our navel is very mysterious — they tied it up and put a machete to heat and, when it was very red, they took it and, ñuiiiis!, they placed it on the little piece of umbilical cord to cauterize it.

To record the interview, the members of Las Jaibas suggested to Gamboa that they return to the river that she had not seen for five years. They traveled kilometers by car, by boat and on foot under the Pacific rain. La mayora made the entire journey with the hope of finding the guava tree where she buried her umbilical cord.

This was one of many trips that the members of Las Jaibas took to produce the eight episodes of “Oshúm and the Tones of Water” with inhabitants of the Anchicayá, Dagua and Cauca, three rivers in their region. “Oshúm” is the “orisha,” or spirit, of water in the Yoruba religion of West Africa and several others in the African diaspora. That is what inspired this series, which, as visual artist Lyann Cuartas tells us, navigates the rivers and profiles their people:

El proyecto es una exploración de cómo las comunidades negras y trans nos relacionamos con el agua. Estas ideas permiten que se amplíen un poco las perspectivas que tenemos sobre los cuerpos de agua. No son solo un cuerpo que está ahí para la extracción o un recurso natural, sino un sujeto con el que estamos haciendo un intercambio. Es una responsabilidad de ambos. Y la espiritualidad media en esa relación. En estas comunidades, la espiritualidad es un medio para conectarse con el río, de ejercer un cuidado, de darle unas cargas simbólicas.

The project is an exploration of how Black and trans communities relate to water. These ideas allow us to broaden our perspectives on bodies of water. They are not there just for extraction or as natural resource, but a subject with whom we are making an exchange. It is a responsibility of us both. And spirituality mediates that relationship. In these communities, spirituality is a means to connect with the river, to exercise care, to give it symbolic meanings.

For Cuartas, life in Cali, the third most populated city in Colombia, constantly prompts this reflection:

Vivimos en una ciudad que tiene supuestamente siete ríos y están en unas condiciones que no permiten habitarles. Olvidamos que tenemos esos cuerpos de agua que existen y que están nutriendo. Muchas de las comunidades que están en esas orillas están no solo conviviendo, sino como tratando de que esa convivencia con el río sea más igualitaria o más amena  y por eso mismo también lo defienden. 

We live in a city that supposedly has seven rivers and they are in conditions that do not allow us to live in them. We forget that we have these bodies of water that exist and that are nourishing. Many of the communities that are on those banks are not only living together, but trying to make that coexistence with the river more equal or more pleasant, and for that very reason they also defend it.

Each protagonist in this audiovisual project has a unique relationship with the river. If for Ana Gamboa the river is the cradle and home of all her childhood memories, for activist Maria del Pilar Escoba, Cauca was a haven, a place of recreation that was denied to trans women. Twiggy, as she is known in Colombia, grew up in Cali and fled to Europe in the eighties, when paramilitary groups carried out what is sinisterly known as social cleansing, murdering sex workers, homosexuals, homeless people and other marginalized people.

Twiggy remembers that trans women were not allowed in public swimming pools:

[Por] ese no tener recreación las mujeres trans, no tener socialización, sitios de acogida y abrazo, era muy singular irnos un lunes para Pance [Ed: un corregimiento del sur de Cali] donde nos podíamos encontrar, donde existían los famosos hongos que se comían con leche condensada, era la hora del porro, de encontrar, por fuera de la clientela, al chico que te agradaba. Eso era Pance para nosotras. 

[Due to] the fact that trans women had no recreation, no socialization, no places of welcome and embrace, it was very special for us to go on a Monday to Pance [a district in the south of Cali] where we could meet, where we could eat the famous mushrooms with condensed milk, it was a time for a joint, to find, outside of the clientele, the boy you liked. That was Pance for us.

She weaves her story with memories of stews cooked over firewood on the banks of the Cauca, but also of the violence against the people with whom she forged connections in the streets.

The stories in this project intertwine the mystery of the rituals around the river, the sweetness of childhood memories and the violence against its waters and communities. In each episode, brutality shows up: armed groups that displace communities, destroy the forests and fill the rivers with mercury in search of gold; coca crops and poisoned rain from aerial spraying; infrastructure projects that break the waterways and fill the waters with sediment. There is barbarism, but also resistance. The communities of these rivers have organized themselves into associations, educational centers, artistic collectives and memory projects. The episodes deal with all these initiatives.

Las Jaibas knew that the central element had to be voices.

El proyecto explora [esta relación] a través de la oralidad, permite escuchar la voz de la persona que está contando su relación con el río. Esa oralidad es la forma en la que ha aprendido esa relación y se ha transmitido en las comunidades negras. Y se puede escuchar en forma de rap, un poema, un rezo, un alabao. Eso nos permite conectar desde esas formas del relato y el arte. 

The project explores [this relationship] through the oral tradition, allowing us to hear the voice of the person who is telling us about their relationship with the river. This oral tradition is the way in which this relationship has been learned and has been transmitted in black communities. And it can be heard in the form of rap, a poem, a prayer, a praise. This allows us to connect through these forms of storytelling and art.

But the visual elements of ritual practices around rivers are also very rich.

Planteamos la imagen como otra dimensión de la voz, como una forma de dignificar, de retratar a esa persona, de apelar a su grandeza, a su imaginación, a lo que recrea cuando compone un altar, a lo que va haciendo en torno al río. En muchas ocasiones, cuando estábamos tomando fotografías y videos, era en un ritual, entonces la cámara nos permitió registrarlo.

We understand images as another dimension of the voice, as a way of dignifying, of portraying that person, of invoking her greatness, her imagination, what she recreates when she builds an altar, what she does in relation to the river. On many occasions, when we were taking photographs and videos, it was in a ritual, so the camera allowed us to record it.

Las Jaibas have a vision of their profession that is quite far from journalism. Two Black women, one trans woman and one non-binary person came together out of pure creative and intellectual affinity. And when they began to produce the podcast, they did not choose the people they interviewed with the aim of being objective or comprehensive, but rather, as Lyann Cuartas explains, of working from their feelings.

Cuando fuimos a Anchicayá, ya conocíamos a Ana Belly y Ana Judy, pero con las idas y venidas, nos hicimos amigas del lanchero y él nos contactó con la mayora Natividad y con doña Sofi. Una va yendo y se va haciendo amiga, se va a quedando en la casa y va tejiendo redes. Nosotras no vamos con la intención de sacar información sino de crear lazos de amistad. 

When we went to Anchicayá, we already knew Ana Belly and Ana Judy, but with our comings and goings, we became friends with the boatman and he put us in contact with mayora Natividad and with Doña Sofi. You go and make friends, you stay in the house and you start building networks. We don't go with the intention of getting information but to create bonds of friendship.

And they are also much different from journalism in regards to what happens after the story is published. It is not a matter of producing, publishing and moving on to the next story, but of returning to the communities. To present the project, they organized a balsada, which is a traditional event in which Black communities in the Pacific travel a stretch of their river in barges with altars and other ritual offerings. They also returned to the communities where they produced the episodes to give the protagonists their portraits, photographs printed on translucent fabrics that they used to exhibit the project at the Museum of Modern Art in Medellín and other public spaces.

Llevar las telas impresas, las fotografías en tela, porque los audios ya los habíamos mandado, ya los escucharon, pero por ejemplo ir a Anchicayá y mostrar las telas, hablar sobre el proceso de producción, de lo que les gustó, de lo que no les gustó, hablar en recocha. Todo eso nos reafirma en la intención de trabajar de otras formas, porque a nosotras nos interesan más las personas, poder decir ‘ella es amiga mía, vamos y yo voy a su casa y comemos, o si ella viene a Cali nos podemos ir a parchar, a rumbear un día’.

Bringing the printed fabrics, the photographs on fabric, because we had already sent the audios, they already listened to them, but, for example, going to Anchicayá and showing the fabrics, talking about the production process, what they liked, what they didn’t like, chitchatting. All of that reaffirms our intention to work in other ways, because we are more interested in people, being able to say “she is a friend of mine, let’s go and I will go to her house and we will eat, or if she comes to Cali we can go to hang out, to party one day.”

Thanks to this work stemming from affection, they were able to accompany mayora Ana on her return to Anchicayá. When she arrived, she did not find the guava tree.

Me dio muchísimo pesar, mi corazón se arrugó cuando miré donde estaba enterrado mi ombligo y el río se lo había llevado. Pero también me dio satisfacción porque es mi río. Es allí donde yo bajaba con el calabazo a recoger el agua, donde yo lavaba los platos, donde andaba con mis pies descalzos, donde también quedó ese recuerdo tan grande de mi niñez, donde vivieron mis padres hasta su último día.

It made me very sad, my heart sank when I looked at where my umbilical cord was buried and the river had taken it. But it also made me happy because it is my river. It is there where I went down with the gourd to collect water, where I washed the dishes, where I walked barefoot, where that great memory of my childhood also remains, where my parents lived until their last day.

Written by Miguel Botero Translated by Teodora C. Hasegan · View original post [es]