The land recounts: memories of a people

On 29th April, our brother Alfredo was invited to participate in a discussion organized by the Family Compensation Fund of Antioquia (Comfama) of our sister country Colombia.

He offered deep reflections on the relationship between words and the earth; he explained how words transcend the human dimension, since all nature speaks. He stressed that the peasants are bearers of the immense wisdom contained in the full conversation with nature. He also mentioned the legacies of the Cajamarca Rural Libraries Network. Here are some sections of what Alfredo said:

- “Here, in our land, the stories and testimonies of the elders teach us that the word is not only subject to the human dimension or to the narrow definitions of dictionaries, but to all living nature: because everything speaks, everything say, everyone participates with their voice and their expression in community life. Dreams herald and animate, plants declare, clouds reflect, hills foretell, stones warn, coca pronounces whether bitter or sweet. The fin-fin bird announces death, the hummingbird proclaims life ... "

- "This land gave birth to a culture brimming with practices and wisdoms capable of conversing with nature to solve the challenges of human survival."

- “For centuries, the indigenous and peasant populations were vetoed from the very nation that they themselves had forged from the roots; all they got from the dominant side was disdain for their culture and mocking prices for their products. But this life-giving culture was also nurturing and taming adverse words, in the same way as it cultivated wheat and tamed bulls and everything that the usurpers of their destiny brought.”

- “Perhaps the greatest legacy is courage: advocating at every step the dignity of our peoples; the gift of celebrating and being thankful for being together; having redeemed the book from its invasive condition to turn it into an allied tool; having built our house in Minga; being and loving each other as a family, in this wonderful land that gives us the blessing of being her children.”