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THE ROOTS OF THE STARS
My name is Sakor García Paniagua. Actually my full name is "Chan Kin Sakor".
In my language, Maya Lacandon, Chan Kin means"Little Sun"
and "Sakor" is the name of a bird, but it also means "Fair", like I am,
since I don't have black hair like my brothers and sisters.
I have always lived here in Na-há, a village on the edge
of the Lacandon Forest, in southern Mexico, the land of Maya.
At Na-há, there must be about 180 of us "Hach Winiks" - "real men" -
that's what our name is, even though everyone calls us "Lacandons".
"Na-há" in Maya means "moon water". And it is also the name of our lagoon.
directed by Piero D'Onofrio
Last night in fact, I dreamed of the lagoon. A strange dream... I must have been
13 years old and I still had long hair according to our tradition.
I was with my brother Kin and my older brother's children.
We went down to get the "kayuko", the canoe that's always moored there,
to go on a trip round the lake.
We sped swiftly across the water and we were having a wonderful time,
in spite of the fact that the kayuko is difficult for children to control
and that it's extremely easy to capsize in it.
In the dream, I gazed at the shores of the lake, at the fish, the animals
and the flowers that grow on the water.
Their floating leaves are the door that allows the spirits
of the underground world to communicate with the surface.
But all of a sudden, I glimpse in the water the house of "Hach-akyum",
the God who created the Lacandons and hear his voice.
He says: "Sakor, my son, the human heart has grown hard.
Men cut down the trees, but the trees are alive and if they die,
the Hach Winiks will die too".
The voice of the God went on:
"the animals that graze and have need of man
must stay in one place and the animals of the Forest
must be able to live in another place.
Sakor, remember that if the Forest comes to an end, I Hach-akyum,
will have to order my brother Akyantó, god of things that come from outside,
to end the world of the "Hach-Winiks". With that the dream ended.
If my father was still alive, I could tell him about it.
My father, Chan Kin the Elder, was the wisest man of all us Hach-Winiks.
He knew the meaning of all dreams. That's why every morning,
I would go to him and tell him about what I had dreamed.
He, who had seen many moons and many suns pass,
could always give me an explanation, because he knew the stories of our past.
When my father died, he was over 110 years old.
I'm still living in our house, together with his two wives
and my brothers and sisters who haven't got married yet.
I've always liked to lie in the hammock and rock happily
while my mother cooks maize tortillas.
My childhood has been a happy one, but now I feel that things are changing,
I'm 18 years old and it's almost time for me to have a family of my own...
And yet, I can't stop thinking about the dream I had last night.
Maybe, I could talk to my brother Chan Kin Cuarto (the Fourth) about it.
He lives in Na-há too, on the road that leads to the lagoon.
He has to go and check the flowering of certain plants and I go with him.
He knows an amazing amount about the forest, because father
used to spend hours explaining the origin and the uses of the plants to him.
Now, these things interest people from other areas as well,
like our friend Nacho, who comes from Mexico City
to study the life of the forest.
"For 500 years, the Lacandon Indians have had the opportunity to see an entire "film",
that consists of the dynamics of the tropical forest, that changes day by day.
While we have only seen some partial frames of this film and never the complete version.
This is why the Lacandons live the forest, they feel the forest.
When they see that the rain is diminishing, or that certain species of birds are active,
or that certain plants are flowering, it is a very special moment
that tells them that something more widespread is happening in the forest".
My brother Cuarto says that this tree still hasn't blossomed.
It means that we will have to wait a bit longer before planting the maize.
I told him about my dream.
He says that to dream water can mean tears, tears of the gods but also men's tears.
Something bad might happen to the community.
But he also says that dreams are warnings and that,
if we listen to them, we can avoid evil.
We will also have to pray in Yaxchilán, in the city of the ancient Mayas
where Hach-akyum now lives, the god that spoke to me in my dream.
And there isn't much time to lose.
My brother immediately sets about getting hold of everything
that will be needed for the ceremony. Meanwhile, I go home to get ready,
I've always wanted to know Yaxchilán, I've never been there before,
even though it's a holy place for all the "Hach Winiks".
A Xate leaf is needed for each member of the community,
that's why Cuarto has to break off so many branches.
For me, going to Yaxchilán is also the chance to do something new.
There isn't much to do to have fun at Na-há. Since they came into the forest
to cut the precious wood and look for oil,
there are roads and then first electricity arrived and then television.
So now to pass the time of day people often drink and sit in front
of the television that they buy as soon as they earn a few bucks.
I've bought a videocassette recorder and a stereo,
saving the money I earned working in the fields.
Something for the journey is still missing, something that
my brother keeps in the "yatoch k'un", the "House of the Gods".
This is where we meet our gods and where we have always held
the Balché ceremony, steeping the bark of a sacred tree in water and sugar
to extract a kind of beer from it.
The other "Hach Winiks" are summoned, we drink and pray.
Balché is also a medicine. Once I had a cough and a fever
and I drank a lot of it, I was almost drunk.
I went to sleep and the next morning, when I woke up, I said:
what's happened to my throat? I feel fine again, what luck...
For a few years now, Na-há has had a house of culture.
We built it ourselves, with a roof made of leaves and guano,
the way it used to be done before.
We preserve traditional objects,
even those nobody knows how to use anymore, like the Lacandon guitar.
The censers have faces and by pouring beverages and small morsels of food
into their mouths we make offerings to the gods.
The sacred drum is dedicated to Kayum, god of music.
What my brother is looking for is the "pom", the resin that will be used
during the ceremony and that he guards jealously.
"Pom" is the food of the gods and it is used to pray to them.
My father Chan Kin the Elder used to say that there are many gods
and that they need to be fed often, so that they then look after us.
Apart from Hach-akyum, there is his son T'up, who rules the sun,
K'ak', god of fire, who protects us from fever and measles,
Akyanthó, god of commerce and foreigners, Metzabok, god of the rain,
who helps grow maize and the other plants of the forest,
like the "pom" tree, from which we extract this resin.
At last we say our goodbyes and set off
I'm so excited.
Victor, a friend from the city who knows Maya places well will drive us in his car.
The ones who stay behind are sad, like Kin, my younger brother,
although he would never admit it.
Outside Na-há the forest gets worse and worse.
Every year it rains less and the crops suffer.
A few years ago all the fish in the lagoon died.
My father used to say that it is caused by the cutting down of the trees
and that if things go on like this, there will soon be nothing left of the forest.
"The Lacandonian Forest is part of what we call "The great Mayan Forest".
After the Amazon forest, it is the second most important forest mass
of a tropical nature on the American continent.
The destruction of the forest increases the existing climatic imbalances:
more rain where once it never rained, less rain where it used to rain,
cyclones, hurricanes...
On a more global level, the loss of the Mayan Forest
may mean the disappearance of species that are still without a name.
The cure for AIDS, for cancer,
for other illnesses might lie in these rare species,
you never know and this must be the heritage of all mankind..."
We have finally reached the "Usumacinta" river.
Guatemala is on the other side, but we don't have to cross the river,
we just have to travel down it for a stretch. I can only think of our final destination.
I have so many things to ask Hach-akyum and I hope he listens to me.
The only baggage I have is my Lacandon Tunic and the time has come to put it on.
There is a strange atmosphere...
It's hard to tell whether this place has been built by men, or by the gods...
In order to enter the ancient city, you must cross a labyrinth-shaped temple.
But as soon as we come out of the building, we find a surprise.
We are approached by a custodian of the archaeological park.
He is very courteous, but warns us that since Yaxchilán has recently
been opened to tourism, if we want to carry out our ceremonies
we will have to respect visiting hours and take care not to ruin the restored stones!
Everything is new to me.
Walking among the ruins, I try to imagine what the city
might have been like 1,300 years ago,
at the time of the great Maya kings "Jaguar Shield" and his son "Jaguar Bird".
Cuarto is rather perplexed and slightly amused by all these people.
I follow him and in spite of everything, I'm still terribly excited.
This is the house of Hach-akyum, this is where we will hold our ceremony.
Little cones have to be made with the "pom", the resin,
one for every person in the family or for anyone we want to pray for.
It's important not to forget anyone, because Hach-akyum will only protect
from evil those people that we have put on the small sacred table!
It's a big responsibility and I'm not going to stop putting resin
on the table until my brother tells me that we have really remembered everyone!
The "Xate" leaves that we have brought have to be rolled up and tied one by one.
Cuarto shows me how to do it and I copy him,
even though I'm not as good at it as he is.
Inside, in front of the stone of the god, the little cones are heaped together
and made into a single mass.
The little heaps of resin become people and when they are burnt,
their scented smoke rises up to the gods and becomes their nourishment.
When men meet the gods, everything is transfigured,
even the sound of their voices.
The leaves held over the fire become impregnated
with the smoke from the incense.
When we return home, we will give these leaves
to the people we have prayed for.
They will keep them and in this way they will receive protection from evil.
Young people nowadays don't carry out these ceremonies anymore.
They prefer other gods that come from outside,
the *** of Guadalupe, Jesus Christ...
My brother Cuarto is one of the few Hach Winiks
who still knows all our traditions.
He and I are very close, even though I know he doesn't approve
of my haircut and that I almost always wear jeans and a shirt.
But I only did it to change my appearance a bit...
and anyway I used to take ages to comb my hair before.
But I won't lose the traditions, because I want to be a good Maya.
There is still something left to be done: hide the leaves that have been left over.
They have been used to pray with and they must be given back to the forest,
so that they don't end up in the hands of people who might desecrate them.
Once upon a time, this used to be a journey on foot from Na-há
that lasted a week and all you came across was forest;
now there are roads and you travel through villages.
Nacho says that in the eighteen years since I was born, half the vegetation
that used to exist when my father was a child, has been destroyed.
"After fourteen years spent coming and going from the forest,
I have noticed a vast destruction. It has been quantified,
there is evidence to prove it, it isn't an illusion.
Unlike a lot of people, I don't have a catastrophic attitude,
but destruction has taken place and it was foreseeable.
The models of development of most of the countries
that have forests are expansive, extensive models,
which attempt to exploit all resources as rapidly as possible,
without thinking of what will happen in the future."
Many of us Hach Winiks don't like the forest anymore,
we prefer the city. I like going to the city,
you can buy all kinds of things and then the girls are pretty...
But it's nice to be there for a while, not live in it, no I wouldn't live there.
We have stopped here at Palenque on the way home, because I want
to buy some new shoes, more fashionable ones.
But it's difficult to find a nice pair of shoes that isn't too expensive.
In the end, I haven't found anything that suited me.
I'll buy some music tapes. But not romantic music,
it makes me feel sad immediately. "Disco" music, that's all right.
I listen to it in my free time, it helps me to relax
and I don't think about anything sad.
There are ancient ruins in Palenque too. This is where the god Hach-akyum
was born from a flower, this is where he had his house,
but when the forest started to shrink and people arrived, he left.
Now it's full of tourists. And there are people who sell goods
even inside the archaeological park.
Even we Hach Winiks sell handicrafts to the visitors,
but we have our shops outside.
This activity brings in very good earnings,
in fact many of us have left the village now
and have started to live permanently in the city.
Just like another one of my brothers, Chan Kin the Third and his family.
"Frankly the future is uncertain...
I don't mean to say that Lacandon culture is perfect
and that everything Lacandons do in relation to the forest is right.
I think that a lot of what they still know will be very useful to be able to survive.
However, I do think that they need support, help, they need to know about the experiences
of other native groups, of human groups that have understood little by little
how to use their own traditional knowledge
and how to assimilate the useful knowledge of other cultures.
From this point of view, I don't know what will happen".
It's time to go back to Na-há. This journey has been very important for me.
The ceremony in the ancient city was a thrilling experience.
Hach-akyum has told me that he will fulfil my wishes because I am a good Maya.
At home my family is expecting me,
they'll want to know everything about the trip.
Even though -- personally - what I like doing best,
is spending as much time as possible outside, in the forest.
There you can run, hide, there are masses of paths and secret places.
Or else you can walk as far as the lagoon, have a bathe and swim.
And, if you feel like it, you can go fishing
or just go for a trip round the lake in the kayuko.
Maybe I should look for the meaning of my dream
in the words of my old father.
Once I asked him: "Daddy, what happens if I cut down a tree?"
And he answered: "Hach-akyum planted stars in the sky and trees in the forest.
Trees and stars have the same roots.
That's why, every time a tree falls, a star falls too."