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The aeroplane takes off from Mexico City.
The route is south-east, towards San Cristóbal, in Chiapas,
the southernmost state of Mexico.
It takes just over an hour to cover the 1000 Km of the journey.
Chiapas is a green land, with woods and pastures.
It 'a region rich in lakes, water basins and streams.
This is where the Maya civilisation was born, flourished and mysteriously fell into decline.
JAGUAR WIND
San Cristóbal de Las Casas is a city that lies
in a peaceful valley of the high plateau.
It was founded in 1528 by Diego de Mazariegos,
sent to Chiapas by the Spanish crown.
Its colonial buildings and its baroque churches
have witnessed a succession of conquistadores
and travellers, governors and mercenaries, missionaries and bishops.
Today the city has two souls.
The first, the most visible one, is the one it received from its founders.
directed by Piero D'Onofrio
San Cristóbal is essentially "ladino",
a word that refers to the Spanish population and culture.
But there is also another aspect, discreet and apparently detached.
Here we are in the lands inhabited by the direct descendants of the Mayas.
The natives live in the villages of the high plateau
and come into the city during the day.
The two souls of the city overlap and sometimes merge.
The feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, patron of Mexico,
is a festivity that has both Catholic and native characteristics.
All this attracts tourism and the demands of tourism accelerate modernisation.
More and more, the survival of the language, the customs, the traditions,
the identity of the Mayas itself, run the risk of disappearing.
Now and then the Mayas make their voice heard.
Their presence in the ladino city is like a wind
blowing down from the high plateau...
But it is a wind that grows weaker all the time,
that asks to be strengthened.
At San Cristóbal, a group of Mayas has chosen an original means
to recover and promote their own culture: street theatre.
As well as being actors, the members of the group are all writers.
Maria, a Maya "tzotzil", and Domingo also follow another of the group's projects:
the teaching of Maya writing in the native communities.
The name of the association is "Sna Itz'ibajom",
which in Maya language means "The house of the writer".
Cristóbal is the association's secretary and he is working on a piece
on the Conquest of America seen through the eyes of the natives.
Francisco, known as "Panchito", has recently left his job as a flower-grower
in order to dedicate himself to gathering traditional tales and writing them down.
Helped by his friends, he is also taking his first steps as an actor.
The group has also set up a video laboratory.
Diego, the president of the association, is in charge of it.
Video is used to record life in the native communities,
drawing inspiration from it for the theatrical work.
Maria Rosenda is in charge of the photography laboratory.
This too is a way for the group to hand down
the visual memory of Maya people, places and traditions.
Xun is one of the group's founding members and lives in Zinacantan,
one of the main villages of the high plateau.
He has recorded on tape a traditional tale in the Maya language.
The leading character is a jaguar that has to cope with the cunning of men.
Stories of men and animals are common in Maya oral tradition
and the actors bear this in mind in creating their characters.
As in the piece: "De Todo Para Todos".
- It's unbearable!
- They've thrown us out of here too!
- Men destroy the forest and leave us with their crap!
- Where can we go?
The frogs see to it that men's impudence is punished,
making them fall ill while they sleep.
Domingo explains Panchito's part to him.
- Blood and pestilence is what we bring here!
- Suffer! Weep! Die like this!
Letizia rehearses the movements of the armadillo,
the chair of the God of the Earth.
- I'm here! I'm here!
In Maya mythology, the jaguar represents the sun
and is among the beings that are creators of mankind.
In spite of these glorious origins, there are few jaguars left in Chiapas today.
One of them dozes in the zoo at Tuxtla Gutiérrez, the state capital.
A short distance away, there is an important place of Maya history:
the "Cañon del Sumidero", a crevice in the earth one kilometre deep.
It is said that at the time of the Spanish conquest,
the Indians threw themselves off the cliff
rather than give themselves up to the Spaniards.
Today you can go down the river that crosses the Cañon by boat.
The waiting visitors are entertained by a group of marimba players,
the marimba being the most popular instrument in Chiapas.
From here, San Cristóbal is only 80 kilometres away,
but until twenty years ago
the route took twelve hours on the back of a mule.
It is also because of this isolation that the communities of the high plateau
have managed to preserve their most ancient traditions until the present day.
Panchito has taken a day off to go and consult the curandero.
Lately, he has been feeling tired, listless and he complains of stomach pain.
The curandero is an indispensable figure in the crucial moments
in the life of the communities.
Even though he is not just a doctor,
it is in this guise that he features among the characters of the theatre group.
The two peasants, infected by the frogs, are racked with pain.
They definitely need help.
- Aaagh! What a pain in my stomach!
- I'm dying!
Panchito has brought some candles, fizzy drinks and "posh", the local brandy.
He bows his head in greeting, in sign of respect.
In the Maya religion the soul, that is immortal, is made up of thirteen parts.
Some of these can move away from the body and subsequently provoke sickness.
The curandero diagnoses the illness by feeling the patient's pulse,
because the soul lives in the blood.
The curandero arrives and suggests examining the woman,
but his tone of voice is slightly too mischievous...
- If you like, I'll touch your wife to find out what she has.
- Maruch, give the gentleman your arm!
The religion of Mayas is a mixture of pre-Hispanic and Catholic elements.
The curandero addresses Jesus Christ, the *** Mary and several saints,
but he also invokes the Lords of the earth, custodians of the forces of nature.
Our heroes, cheated of their lands, have planted maize in the forest,
but without asking the God of the Earth for permission
and so, to punish them, he has made them fall ill.
- If you wish, I will pray for you!
- Please sir, cure us!
The infusion that Panchito is to drink is extracted from the bark of a sacred tree.
Only the curandero knows where this plant grows
and part of his power comes from this unique knowledge.
The precise spot in fact, has been revealed to him in a dream.
But tea isn't the only drink used in the ritual...
...and the actors take their cue from it for an amusing sketch.
The cure, that in reality takes several hours, has had effect.
Panchito has recovered his energy and can go back to work.
Maria has gone back to her village, "Nichnamtik",
that in Maya means "flower of the lagoon".
She is going to visit the school. But it is not the "official" school.
Here the kids learn to read and write in their mother tongue: "tzotzil",
that along with "tzeltal" is the most widely spoken Maya language in the area.
Maria and Domingo pursue another of their association's activities:
training people to become teachers in reading and writing Maya language.
in the various communities of the high plateau.
The teacher has trained at the courses held by Sna Itz'ibajom
and is one of 11 teachers that work regularly with the association.
This activity stated in 1983 and since then over 300 pupils have obtained a qualification.
At the end of the course, each pupil is asked to write a little story
that will be published by the association.
The school has been set up inside a warehouse for maize.
Some of the corn-cobs are of the blue variety
that produces a sweeter flour, very good for making tortillas with.
In the centre at San Cristóbal, the writer-actors re-arrange the library
and the many publications on native culture.
Until a few years ago, nobody knew how to read and write
in one of the Maya languages and there were no methods of teaching.
Thanks to Sna Itz'ibajom's work and to the support from Mexican intellectuals,
the oral tradition of the Mayas has started to be recovered and written down.
The characters in the theatrical plays are often inspired by the tales and legends
gathered in the native communities.
As Xun explains, the "Cimarrón ***" is an imaginary creature who bothers people,
pesters women and frightens children.
Panchito offers to try on the mask.
- Watch out, ***!
- Here comes the girl!
In the group's version, the "Cimarrón ***" also possesses the characteristics
of the bat-god of the ancient Mayas.
But this doesn't prevent him from ending up being jeered at,
while he attempts to satisfy his ancestral hunger for women...
The theatrical costumes worn by the actors are based on traditional native costumes.
The making of the fabrics, that is often a real art form,
is one of the most visible aspects of the Maya culture in Chiapas.
The colours, the geometrical shapes and the designs all have a specific meaning
that often varies from one community to another and from one family to another.
Some forms of embroidery require considerable expertise.
The weavers say that the art of embroidery was taught to women in their dreams
by the "primigenial Mother".
Often, in order to be able to work well, a craftswoman has to fast for three days,
pray and wait that the Patron of Fabrics of her community
comes to visit her in a dream.
This tradition too risked being forgotten
with the diffusion of synthetic fibres and dyes
and the disappearance of the older craftswomen.
But over the last few years, women have started
to get organized in craft co-operatives,
also in order to find new kinds of markets outside the communities.
In this way, the older weavers have started to teach the young girls again.
Sna Itz'ibajom's actors work closely with these craftswomen's associations,
in which their own mothers, wives and daughters often work.
The masks and the stage props are made by the actors themselves.
The custom of people disguising themselves as animals and imaginary creatures
is common in all the Maya's traditional feasts of the high plateau.
"The loafer and the vulture" is the group's most successful work.
It's based on a very well known story: the loafer who turns into a vulture
and thinks that like that he can spend his time flying lazily around.
But instead he will lose his wife, his house and his own life.
- How are you doing?
- Huh! Always here working away!
The dramatic play "Jaguar Dynasty" is a magic journey into Maya mythology,
that a shaman sends his assistant on.
The two of them watch the jaguar-men, guardians of the four corners of the world
who -- while dancing -- give origin to the whole of mankind.
The show was filmed by someone who accompanies the group.
Even though the quality of the filming is not outstanding,
it is a unique opportunity to see the actors at work in front of a native audience,
that would otherwise be unwilling to be filmed or photographed.
The group has written this play drawing inspiration from the "Popol Vuh",
the sacred book of the ancient Mayas.
In fact for the actors, the theatre is a means to recover native history
and make its deep values known.
Here are the legendary twin heroes who trick the god of death,
played by Cristóbal, killing him with a cunning stratagem.
The final part of the drama sees the staging of a historical episode:
King K'uk Balam (Jaguar Bird) comes into conflict with the other tribes,
consequently weakening the strength of all the Mayas.
A lesson can be drawn from this: only through unity the native groups
will be able to win the recognition of their own rights,
denied during centuries of oppression.
- Now you will pay for your rebellion, Jewelled Skull!
- You will be sacrificed in the "game of the ball"!
- May your blood bathe the steps of our temples!
The Mayas of Chiapas live mostly in houses without flooring or drains,
without running water or electricity, in spite of the fact that this region
is one of the biggest producers of energy in the whole of Mexico.
Often the natives, all peasants, have been deprived of the fertile lands
that have always belonged to their communities.
The corruption of the authorities and the connivance with the landowners
to take the land away from the peasants is performed, with farcical overtones,
by the actors of Sna Itz'ibajom.
- All right, old friend!
- We'll send them off to work in the forest and you will have their land!
- Thanks! Come and celebrate!
In January 1994, the Zapatista rebellion explodes among the natives of Chiapas.
They ask for: dignity, education, justice.
The peasant woman turned guerrilla fighter says:
"this is a struggle fought by everyone for everyone".
- It's a struggle fought by everyone for everyone,
- so that our children may live in justice!
- You, hide! And you, get down on the ground, fast!
- The enemy's coming!
- Open fire!
Maria, Domingo, Cristóbal, Panchito, Xun...
...and all the actors of Sna Itz'ibajom work to establish and strengthen
the pride in native identity...
...to strengthen the light wind that blows from the high plateau.
The witchdoctor says to his assistant:
"if you are only thinking in terms of a year, sow maize.
If you are making plans for a hundred years, plant a thousand trees.
But if you make a plan for a thousand years,
educate your children and may they educate their descendants".